Dexter in the House
by G.E Waldo
Summary: Summary: Dexter/House crossover. During his summer vacation, Dexter hunts a New Jersey killer. When he discovers who the next target is, saving him will be harder than he thinks.
1. Chapter 1

**Dexter in the House.**

By GeeLady

Summary: Dexter/House crossover. During his summer vacation, Dexter hunts a New Jersey killer. When he discovers who the next target is, saving him will be harder than he thinks.

Pairing: House/Dexter

Rated: M, NC-17, Mature, Adult! Language. Gore. Murder. Dexter/House Slash**. **

Disclaimer: I like Dexter, he's sexy, but I would never try to abduct him 'cause I hear he has a dark side. And House, well, he just melts my buttons!

_**"Forwards, Backwards and Somehow Else, Part III" is coming VERY soon!! Promise**_. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this. "**Dexter"** is a kick-ass damn-hot show! Wow! Very different than but every bit as good as House MD.

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_**"It isn't right for a good person to die young. It's less right that a good person who helps others should die young. Or even kick off in middle age. The least right thing is for such a person to be brutalized and murdered. But the world bleeds with killers and their victims. **_

_**I should know. I am one. I'm Dexter. I'm a serial killer but with a twist -- I only kill murderers."**_

Dexter pulled his rental car up to the Hyatt and tossed the keys to a lot-jockey. After being led to his room by a bellboy who couldn't have been older than fifteen, he set up his laptop and began research on his newest victim.

Four men in sixteen months. Not all done the same way. By "done" meaning cut. Throat. Deeply. From ear to ear, like a big red smile. Or gutted with one fell swipe. Fast, furious. Savage. Anger was there in this butcher. Rage at someone or something the someone's represented. He killed with complete involvement. He wanted to be swallowed by the satisfaction of it. He swung the knife like a conductor swings his baton. Full bodied action. Crazed with the sound and the power. Music in the flesh.

Somewhere, too, waiting to be uncovered, was the meaning.

Dexter studied the some-hacked, some legit-borrowed crime photos with the eye of an expert. All the victims had been left to bleed out at the scene. Two of the victims had engaged in sex before death. One had been a very prominent but retired vascular surgeon at University Medical in Princeton. All had not been killed the same way, but all had been cut.

The police had not connected the killings because the victims, although all having been killed via wet-work, had died via different sorts of wet-work. Also in different towns and cities. They had not known each other or frequented the same clubs, and were of diverse ages.

Dexter knew how law enforcement reasoned: Location, method of death, age of victim, location of body wounds, how the bodies were left, none of the criteria held enough similarities to label them the work of a serial killer.

Dexter worked for law enforcement. But he reasoned differently. This killer, Dexter saw from the photos of the wounds, loved wet-work. This guy came when he saw blood spill. Lots of it -- the blood, not the cum. This guy enjoyed watching his victim die quickly. Die terrified. Die knowing that it was unstoppable.

It was the mind of the killer Dexter studied, not just his art.

"Wow." Dexter scrolled, studying the faces of the victims. Two things the police had disregarded as having significant connections. All four victims were men. And all four, in some fashion, worked in the medical field.

Dexter rose from the chair, his ass numb from sitting, and stripped off his T-shirt, revealing the fit body of a man in his early thirties. Sandy brown hair kept short and neat framed a well put together strong boned face with expressions that shifted from stone cold to self depreciating smirk. Either might be dangerous. Two very green, very watchful eyes looked out from beneath delicately up-swept eyebrows.

Dexter breathed deeply. This guy liked his blades. And, of course, the blood.

All that blood.

Dexter, a man of ironic humor, decided he would call him Red. "Pleased to meet you."

XXX

_**"Dad always told me: Pick your victims well. Choose wisely. Let a passion - a vocation if you will - get out of control and you may as well cross out having a normal life. My life isn't normal. Neither am I. But I do cross out lives. Those who are out-of-control. Those who's passions fall into the realm of murderous obsession. I kill these men (and woman occasionally), but I understand them too. There but for the grace of Dad and personal ethics, go me. Yeah, even murderers and freaks have ethics and boundaries. Just really, really awful ones."**_

Over dinner of broiled fish in the fancy Hyatt restaurant, Dexter read over the finer details of all four murders. Reading under his breath about death and corpses while eating had never bothered him. Not much had ever bothered him. Difficult to feel bothered when you don't feel.

Retired Surgeon victim. Second body found, but forensics had established it had been the most recent kill. Doc' had been deeply cut on his thighs. "Artificial heart-valve. Pace-maker." Dexter read the physicians medical history. "Vascular surgeon with a dicky heart. No free lunch for anyone." Body robbed and dumped.

He closed Doc's file and opened the male nurse's. He had been cut lengthwise along his abdomen. Nothing was remarkable about him other than he had been deaf. "That's...interesting." Dexter scooped a fork full of rice and shoveled. It had been a long day and he was hungry. He read the other files. In every case the victims had been robbed or raped, or both.

"Bodies estimated to have been killed sixteen months apart. First victim's body found March eighteenth, two thousand seven. Thought to have been dead two weeks upon discovery. Second victim found within days after death, July twenty-third. Third body discovered January seventeenth, two thousand eight. Decomposition suggests body had been dead for at least three months."

Dexter did a quick calculation in his head. "Mid-November, two thousand seven for the third victim. Four months. They're being killed four months apart."

He checked the first victim's file. Vascular surgeon Doc' was killed about the middle of March of two thousand eight. The times of death were consistent.

Dexter's eyes wandered to his watch. The tiny calendar told him it was the twentieth of June. "He's going to kill again. Inside a month."

That didn't leave much time. Unfortunately he had no idea who the fifth victim was going to be.

A trip to the local library and a in-depth study of Princeton, New Jersey's Who's Who would be in order. Dexter checked his watch again. Nine-thirty-five PM. Too late. First thing in the morning then.

XXX

"Good morning. I'm Doctor House."

The youth on the exam table, face grinning from ear to ear, lost his smile when he saw who his doctor was. "Where's Doctor Chan?"

House had his nose in the kid's chart. "Who?"

"The Chinese doctor. She was the one who helped me yesterday."

House finally looked at him. "Oh. Yeah, she is pretty, isn't she?" House pulled the wheeled stool over and sat down, easing his weight off his bum leg. "Doctor Chan isn't on duty today. I am." House smiled unhappily. "Lucky me. What's the problem?"

The kid gulped. "Um.. I think I have a cold or-"

"-How old are you?"

"Fifteen."

"Well, Doctor Chan, just so you don't _ever_ have to come back here and waste the hospital's, or more importantly, _my_ time again, is twenty-seven years old and married."

"I don't care. I love her."

"Right. You don't even know how to fake a cold."

"Please can't you at least send her in for a minute?"

"You think she's going to leave her new husband for you? Because you must be tall too, and rich. And drive a new BMW?"

The kid's pale face fell. "What do I do about it? I'm crazy about her."

House sighed. "You like Lucy Lu?"

"Yeah."

"Get a poster, hang it on your wall. Do unspeakable things to it. Works every time."

House left his amorous patient behind and ran into Cuddy. "Any more boring sniffles I can diagnose? It keeps me sharp you know."

"You have a visitor. In my office."

"I hope she has boobs out to here." He indicated with his left hand held six inches from his biceps, "and an ass, " he glanced at her posterior, "half that size."

Cuddy ignored House's backhanded flirting. She had grown used to it. Even secretly enjoying his little digs. "He is from the police."

At House's wary face, "Not Tritter. He's with the Miami Forensics. Homicide."

"I'm not hiring."

"Neither am I, and that's not why he's here."

"Why _is_ he here?"

Cuddy walked away. "Go find out. Not too long, I want my office back."

A younger, good looking man wearing jeans and a cream colored golf shirt stood as House entered Cuddy's office.

"I'm Dexter." He extended his hand and House looked at it.

Instead of shaking the offered hand, House sat in Cuddy's desk chair and tapped his cane on the floor. "Cuddy says you're from Miami. She seems to think you're here on some official business for the Miami P.D. Since they sent a forensic specialist to deliver whatever this message is, that's doubtful. They would have sent a flunky or, here's a better and cheaper idea, used the phone."

Dexter sat back down. "I'm here on vacation."

"Any relatives?"

Dexter turned his head ever so slightly, a small smile played about his lips. Doctor House was sizing him up. He was _analyzing_ him. This was going to be fun. "No." He waited...

"Then you're not here on vacation..."

Bingo. This Doctor was on the ball.

"No one who lives and works in Miami would come to New Jersey unless it was to visit relatives. You came here on your volition."

Dexter nodded, delighted with this one. He had already visited three of the medical community members he decided were the most likely candidates for Red's next wet-works. Two had dismissed him as a nut. One had taken his words to heart but in a way that invited the attention and adventure. After House, there were three more.

"I'm on vacation."

"You're nuts. But as long as you're here, we have doctors for that."

Dexter smiled openly, without teeth. He stared at House without blinking, in that way he knew he had, it un-nerved people. Made them shift their bodies and look away. For a respectable interval, House returned that stare, then looked down at his cane. "I am from the Miami police. I'm here about a murder."

"I haven't killed anyone, well, not _lately_. And even if I have, I'm a doctor. We're allowed."

"This isn't an accusation Doctor House. I'm here to warn you." House's eyes didn't widen. Even his blood pressure didn't rise. Dexter would notice it if it had. He was the blood expert after all. House was a pretty cool customer. "I'm hunting a serial killer who's working in New Jersey, Princeton actually. He's murdered four already and I think you might be on his list for next victim." Now let's see if _that_ gets any reaction. If not, he'll bring out the big gun.

"Why me?"

Everyone asked that. Reactions to the news you might become a murder victim were surprisingly varied. Usually ranging from dismissal to a mixture of curiosity, anticipation, excitement or trepidation.

House was curious, yes. But the fear that leaped into his eyes, carefully controlled fear, placed behind a need to know more, was a new one. House has been under the gun before.

Dexter leaned forward a bit and relaxing his elbows on the knees. "Because you work in the medical field in New Jersey and because you're handicapped."

House stared for a few seconds. "So your killer murders handicapped people? He's not a politically correct killer, is he?" House relaxed a bit too. "If that's all you've got to go-"

Dexter thought it best to stop the doubts before they took root. "-Doctor House, why are you good at your job?"

Without hesitation, "Because I don't treat anything as trivial. In my line of work, any detail, any lie, might affect the outcome. The outcome usually meaning the patient dies."

"So you're the last line of defense. And you do it well because you love solving the puzzle. And you like,you_ understand_ puzzles. Puzzles are like a really good drug for you."

House acceded to that with a nod.

"I'm good at my job, too. You might not think so because of my age, but I'm the best there is actually. I can see connections where others are blind. Some people hate me for it." Dexter saw from House's expression that being hated for his genius was a situation with which he was acquainted. "The police here don't think there's a serial killer who's targeting handicapped men working within the medical community. I _know_ there is. Because I like serial killers. I _understand_ them. They're _my_ drug."

House sat forward also, mimicking Dexter's posture. House wanted to know more now. He was taking Dexter seriously. "So I might be a victim. What do I do about it?"

Dexter set his lips. "I'll suggest what I suggested to the others. Serial killers are good at their job. This guy is very good. He tracks, he follows, he studies, he learns, everything he can about his victim, and when he's _sure _you're what he wants, he'll kill you. I want you to stay with a friend. Or failing that, don't go home the same way every day. Don't come to work the same way. Don't walk alone anywhere, especially at night. Don't open your door for anyone you don't completely trust. Get a gun."

"There must be other handicapped peo-"

"-Not like you. Not a doctor. Not a handicapped doctor. Not a handicapped doctor who's handicap is a bad leg."

"Why is that significant?"

"Just a theory I'm leaning toward." Dexter looked away out Cuddy's office window. "This guy has murdered four others. He kills about every four months. It's been three months since his last victim. He's got a favorite disease. You fit the symptoms perfectly. Not everyone he's killed is as high profile as you, but all serial killers are arrogant. If they can murder someone richer or more powerful, it's an extra bonus. And they think the police are stupid. Which is the only way _they_ are stupid."

House rolled his cane between his palms. "He could get to me here."

"You speak from experience."

"Two years ago, a guy walked into my office. I didn't know him, but he seemed to know me, and he shot me. I almost died."

"I'm sorry."

House sat back and stood, easing his weight carefully, Dexter saw, off of his bad leg. Should his life depend on it, House would not be able to run.

"The best option," Dexter said before House left, an option he knew House would not take up, "Is to stay at my hotel with me until I catch him."

"Turn him over to the cops?"

"Sure."

House stared. "How do I know you're not the killer? And all this is just an elaborate ruse to gain my trust?"

"I think you have a sharp instinct. Besides," Dexter stood. "If I was the killer, I still would have spoken of myself in the third person, but I would have used much more flattering adjectives. I would have called myself brilliant and an artist. I would have suggested that I might never be caught. I would have alluded to god-like qualities; power. Maybe even righteousness."

House never took his eyes off Dexter as he made his point. Bluest eyes I've ever seen, Dexter thought. He handed House a slip of paper with the name and address of the hotel including his room and cell phone numbers.

House accepted the paper. "Did anybody on your list accept the offer to bunk with you?"

"No. But I didn't expect them to. I even booked a suite. Two bedrooms, four queen sized."

"Really. Even though you knew no one would-?"

"-there's always hope."

House nodded and left. Dexter watched the physician limp through the doors and down the hall. "He'll call."

XXX

_**"Doctor House didn't listen to my warning, at first. I thought he might not. So I followed him home that day. And then to work the next day. And home again. I guess a bum leg limits social activities. I have two good legs but I'm only one man. Out of the potential victims, House was the most interesting. And if I thought he was interesting, Red probably would too. Red and I are alike in many ways. **_

_**Besides, House had the bluest eyes I've ever seen on anyone. And he was intelligent and he knew it. And he was the best in his field, and he knew that. House was me, twenty years from now. Who can resist that?**_

_**Once in a while House's dark haired friend would drop in at his apartment (main floor apartment. Bad. Easy access. Easy egress. Easy kill), and leave again a couple of hours later. Two hours: Too much time to share a beer. Not enough time for a movie and pizza. **_

_**Just enough time for a good roll on the hay, though. I wonder which one has control in the bedroom? I followed them at lunch breaks. After watching House spar with Doctor Wilson, it would seem that House had the over-all upper hand. But after seeing the watchful, possessive way Doctor Wilson looked at House,...I'd put my money on Wilson. **_

_**I wonder if House told his dark haired friend (Plainsborough Oncologist James Wilson I quickly learned) about me? About our conversation? I doubt it. What would he tell him? -- "A guy on vacation from Miami said I might be murdered pretty soon. 'Nother slice of pizza?"**_

_**Not likely. **_

_**I'm keeping my eye on House. I think he's the next victim. He's the one I would have picked."**_

_**XXX**_


	2. Chapter 2

**Dexter in the House.**

By GeeLady

Summary: Dexter/House crossover. During his summer vacation, Dexter hunts a New Jersey killer. When he discovers who the next target is, saving him will be harder than he thinks. _**This story will prove to be a long one. If it appears I'm taking my time with it, I have a sound reason: I want this to be my best fic' EVER. So I know my readers will display their kind patience with me as they have always done. You're the reason I write you see. **_

Pairing: House/Dexter

Rated: M, NC-17, Mature, Adult! Language. Gore. Murder. Rape. Dexter/House Slash** & **House/Wilson.** PLEASE take warning! Some scenes may be highly disturbing to some readers. **

Disclaimer: I like Dexter, he's sexy, but I would never try to abduct him 'cause I hear he has a dark side. And House, well, he just melts my buttons!

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_**I have a bad feeling about this case. And for me to have a feeling, let alone a bad one... **_

_**At least my vic' - well, Reds potential vic' - House, understands me a little. It's easier to work with someone who gets you. I understand House too. We're both freaks. We're both outsiders, with one difference: I'm trying to fit into society because I was born an outsider and I'd rather not be marked as a freak, which would be dangerous to me. **_

_**House, on the other hand, was born into society but soon discovered he didn't fit at all and now, older, tired, and cynical,..he doesn't care. Which is dangerous to him. People don't like outsiders. They don't like something they can't understand. But people are lazy, selfish and afraid, so they don't try to understand, they try to get rid of it. **_

_**Red is an outsider too, only he thinks he's inside. He believes he is the most inside anyone could ever be. Red's right and everyone else is wrong. Especially those who are like himself -- lonely, maimed, freakish, circus types -- and yet unlike himself -- successful, having colleagues and friends, a full set of testicles and even dates occasionally -- to the extent that it scares the fuck out of him. You get rid of whatever scares the fuck out of you. Especially when you're a homicidal maniac. **_

_**I should know.**_

_**Red doesn't like House. House reminds him, in some way, of himself and Red can't stand that. Reds "society" is dirty. He wants to tidy it up.**_

_**But Red is still fairly new at this Kill For Fucked-up Reasons thing. It's like a job he answered in the "Want Ads". He went in with trepidation and then found out he didn't suck at it all that much. Now I think he's refined his job skills with revenge. That makes for a really fucked up fuck up. **_

_**So Red's had success at his chosen vocation thus far. And that makes him a confident fuck up. He not only likes murder, he's good at it. And, even better, he's good at getting away with it. Murderers are egoists -- if they succeed once, they'll succeed again. And they're narcissists -- it's all about them. **_

XXX

He had convinced himself to dismiss the forensic (if that's what he was) investigator soon after he had left Cuddy's office. Hadn't even told Cuddy what the meeting had been about and she, in her politically correctness, hadn't asked. Though he'd seen her chomping at the bit, dying to know.

House, five o'clock shadow closer to midnight, dumped his backpack on the floor and draped his jacket over the chair he always kept near his apartment door. When you walk with a cane, the less you have to carry the least distance, the better your crappy leg feels.

Deciding to shed a man's creepy warning and actually following your own advice to do so are not always happy bunkies. His guts ached with hunger and tossed with nausea. He'd had little time to eat, other than Vicodin, but now that dinner time had arrived...

House ceased his slow limp to the couch. He turned back and looked at his front door. Limped back. Turned the dead-bolt.

Not taking a warning seriously doesn't mean you have to be stupid about it too.

He had driven home, stopping to pick up a mickey of Louisiana Blended. Tomorrow, depending on the behavior of his leg, he might drive, ride or get Wilson to pick him up. He poured a tumbler half full of the Blended. Usual morning routine, deciding on which method to get to the hospital. Nothing different about that. Nothing needed to be.

House swallowed a good mouthful and felt the burn. Nothing different about that either.

House switched off the lamp and by remote switched the television on. Illumination in electric blue flickered into the nearby dark of the livingroom, just skirting the blackest corners. Opaque shadows stared from the walls where objects met in secret. The lamp came to life in the stream of the television glow, it's thin shadow darting back and forth across the wall.

House stared mindlessly at the infomercial on mute. Cheap earrings and necklaces made more sparkly by brilliant light were espoused. Smooth female necks and hands displayed the gems with pasted smiles.

Big smiles sliced their flushed cheeks in half. Whore-red lipstick. A smile in red. Dexter had described the murders in broad detail. Still it had been enough to leave an impression, which House understood had been the man's intent. Devious.

Freak me into believing him. Make me poop my pants and I'll curl up on his rented Queen-size. _Only no one is trying to kill me._

A cough outside his window made him start, then quite breathing. Another cough and two people laughed together as they passed by.

Right. Friday night. Date night. Party time. Bars, music, laughing, drinking...

House sipped his luke-warm alcohol.

XXX

The slayings. His theory. Dexter knew there was something wrong with it. Or wrong about the profile of his killer. He had already come to think of Red as his. Not a friend of course. A colleague? Of a certain ilk perhaps, yes.

A _possession._ Eventually he would find this man (or, less likely, woman), and bring him to his plastic place. Another slide, a thing so small to represent so great a change in the landscape of New Jersey. Kill ten killers, and a State was safer. Dispatch a hundred,...maybe the country could sleep at night just a little bit better. He'd need another slide box.

Dexter knew he might need to convince Doctor House to let him help him. It was a day and a night already and the doubting doc' had not called. Dexter frowned, his powers of persuasion usually had better results than this. A few more hours and Dexter would have to-

-his phone rang.

"Never doubted myself for a minute." He said to the device. Then picked it up. "Everything okay, Doctor House?"

There was the slightest pause at the other end, but House recovered his surprise quickly. "Super." And his aplomb. _Good for you. _

"Nice night for a drink." Dexter said. Not a question, not even a suggestion. Just bait.

House was too curious not to bite. "Jamieson's. Pub down on Fifteenth. I'll be there in twenty minutes."

"See you there." Dexter gathered up his coat and keys. House was not a usual man. He had remarkable self control when he wanted it. Or just didn't give a whip. But he cared about this.

_He ought to._

_I, of all people, should know._

XXX

House had picked a nice quiet booth in the rear of the bar, away from curious eyes and ears.

Dexter slid into the booth during a brief interval when House had his head turned toward the old fashioned coin operated table top jute box. It was just for show as a metal square had been screwed on over the coin slot.

When House turned back and found he was suddenly no longer alone, he jumped. Recovering quickly, "You like sneaking up on people?"

"It's only sneaking if they don't notice you." Dexter replied, holding up two fingers to the waitress at the bar, indicating he wanted two more of whatever House was drinking.

"What makes you so sure it's me who the next victim?"

"It fits." Dexter answered. "You perfectly fit his criteria for his next kill."

"No other possibilities?"

"None that fit as well." Dexter could see his explanation, though not yet entirely clear to him, satisfied House as to its logic. Of course, House was a diagnostician. He had to treat sick patients by fitting their symptoms with likely diseases. What fit best determined the medicine. With Red, what fit best determined the kill. "Red-" Dexter apologized with a quick smirk, "That's just a temporary name for our killer. Red is motivated by many things. The need for blood, the need for the person to bleed well and then the need for him or her to die. Red wants vengeance of a particular order."

The waitress arrived with two heady beers. Dexter paid the lady.

"Thanks." House said and sipped at his.

Dexter took a gulp and continued, his words like a professors talking with his Ace student. "Serial killers never kill just for sport. They don't do it for money or even sex though you may have read otherwise. The sex is sometimes a partial motivator but never the base reason."

"Why not? I thought Dahlmer raped his victims. I thought what he was after was sex and power."

"He did rape them. But his motivation for kidnaping them to begin with was his pathetic loneliness. His power was to control that need by controlling his victims. Dahlmer needed not to be rejected by those he took an interest in or used and abandoned after they were finished with him. He wanted closeness, intimacy but not to reveal too much of himself in the process. He grew up being mostly ignored by his cold, remote parents, who eventually abandoned him in an empty house when he was sixteen. They left him without a note or a goodbye, to fend for himself."

Dexter sipped his beer and watched House listening to him, leaning over the table and watching his eyes. Dexter found them almost hypnotic. He imagined people found it difficult to look away from Doctor House's eyes as they did from his own. "As for the sex stuff...girls baffled Jeffery, intimacy and sex itself confused him and he was deeply ashamed of his homosexuality. How does a youth like that find intimacy and true love? The short answer is, he doesn't."

"So how does this guy track his victims? More specifically, why me? You said you had a theory."

Dexter wasn't positive about his theory and he was reluctant to divulge his reasoning to Doctor House. For one thing, it was insulting. House was intelligent, analytical, calm in manner but that didn't mean cool headed-ness necessarily followed. How did he feel about being a cripple?

Dexter decided he needed to know more. "How are you coping with your handicap?"

It was obvious that House resented the question. Personal inquires, it appeared, did not top House's list. "If you know enough about me that you suspect your Unsub - that is what you people call them right? - is targeting me, then you don't need to ask."

"I need to know about you if I'm going to protect you."

"You know where I live, my route to work, my habits, the fact that I'm lazy and won't move from my couch unless someone's dying..."

"I need to know how you will react if the bastard catches up to you-"

"-Maybe he won't catch up to me?"

"He caught up to the other four. He sharpened his knife, took a steadying breath and slaughtered them."

Dexter eased off. "I'm not trying to terrify you, I'm trying to prepare you. Do you render a diagnosis by ignoring your patient's symptoms? Or do you find out everything you can? Their medical history, their eating habits, whether they are into kink, does his or her better half still think he or she is _still_ the other better half, what fun drugs do they like to sniff or swallow, what kind of poisons does dear devoted hubby or wifey keep in the shed,..." Dexter paused and drained his glass. "I'm telling you as an expert in my field, I know how to diagnose my sicko's by their victims. Understand the victim, or potential victim - in this case: _you_ - find the _reason_ they had to die and I'll understand the perp'."

House was not that impressed but he was taking him more seriously. "Will you have his name and address?"

"I'll know how to find him. Or, if he finds us first, I'll know how to stop him." Dexter used his own hypnotic eyes to close his line of reasoning. "I'm his doctor. I'm his _cure_."

Dexter played with the lip of his glass, tracing its edge with a finger. "I don't think you should go home tonight. I also think you need to call your boss and tell her you won't be in for a while. Do you have any back vacation saved up?"

"I have a few weeks. And sick-leave." It amounted to two and one half months of away time he had not taken advantage of. Which was surprising even to House. His leg was the reason he ought to be taking his allotted time off but it was also the reason he didn't. He didn't like his leg telling him what to do. House also worried just a little. There was a doubt, too, squatting down in a dark corner of his mind: If he stayed away too long, his job might cease to matter. He might not matter to it anymore.

Foreman was tossing his head and chomping at the bit to step in and take over and once Foreman got his two big feet supporting his still young and strong shoulders, healthy body and determination in the door...Cuddy might see what she had been missing all along.

"I'll need to call in at least once a day while I'm off." That was a lie and they both knew it. Dexter would allow House his little safety line, though. He understood when someone wanted your job or at least hated you enough to want you to _not_ have your job. "Sure."

XXX

House limped slowly into the hotel room. Dexter shut and locked the door after him, but he let the door close a little too loudly for House who turned around sharply at the bang.

House was jumpy. Dexter could read what House was thinking like the words were scrolling across his forehead. _Maybe you (meaning Dexter) are the killer_. "Just relax. Doctor House. Take that other room. Softer bed."

House limped away and flung his back-pack onto a padded chair beside a small desk. He shed his work jacket and limped to the washroom, closing the door with a bang.

Dexter smiled. House was unhappy here. Unhappy with _him_ here. _Unhappy._

Dexter checked his cell phone messages and answered them while House was otherwise occupied. House was unhappy here but he was safe. Red would not think to look for his doctor victim in a five star hotel suite. But then, if they _stayed_ at this five star hotel, Dexter would have little success tracking Red down. Circumstances dictated he go looking for Red. And the bait had to be set or Red would never emerge from the woods. If you wanted to bag a wolf, you had to bait the trap.

Dexter still wasn't entirely sure how the hell he was going to accomplish that part.

Especially the part about convincing the bait to expose himself to the wolf. That stuff tended to be tricky.

For now, for today, he needed to have House settle in to his new routine for the next few weeks. Routine meaning not go anywhere or do anything or call anyone without Dexter being there to know all about it. He imagined it would be like trying to convince a teenager to give up on the ideas of cars and sex, with roughly the equal risk of a screaming tantrum. With a bum leg, what did House do on his days off?

"Rent hookers." House snipped when Dexter posed the question. Then he relented, not seeing any real reason to be antagonistic. "Play the piano, the guitar. Video games. Drink. Drink some more."

Dexter would have to try and provide House some of his favorite things but not today. It was past dinner time and he was hungry. He asked House the same and got a nod. "Steaks and salad okay? I'm picking up the tab."

House's blue eyes lit up. They practically beamed.

Dexter took that as an okay. He ordered room service and they enjoyed New York cut rare's with Mediterranean salad and Tropical Trifle for dessert. House finished every last bite. Dexter imagined that were he dining in private, the Doc' would probably have licked the plate.

Room service came for clean-up and House headed for the shower. When Dexter did not hear the water running, he hesitated only momentarily before he knocked on the door.

From inside, "What?"

"You okay in there?"

Frustration and resentment poured out from under the door. "No. I'm spending a few weeks of my vacation in a hotel with a freak who tracks freaks, away from my own bed and my own bathroom - Why the _hell_ would I be okay?"

Dexter heard House filling up the sink. If not showering , he was sure House wasn't going to fit in there, so...

Dexter opened the door. House, who had shed his clothing but for his jeans, looked back. He was un-startled, as if he'd had some experience with people barging into his private bathroom, apartment and world without invitation. Dexter remembered seeing House talking, very animatedly, with the good looking, dark haired Doctor Wilson. They had spoken with familiarity, like they had known each other for many years. Since they were probably sleeping together too, then maybe dark haired Wilson was the barge in-er?

"Sorry." Dexter said. With his trained eye for details, he recognized instantly the problem House, though having said nothing about it, was having. The tub-shower combination did not have any handrails. Dexter wondered how difficult it might be for House to get in and out. He also wondered how bad Houses leg was, but knew it was wiser not to ask. "Look, if you need help..."

"I don't need help." House caught Dexter staring at him. "And thanks for the steak dinner, but I don't put out on a first date."

Dexter hung his arms and his shoulders sagged. He wasn't really of tired of House or his rudeness yet, he just felt like he was eventually going to be. Good thing House was interesting enough to somewhat counter-balance his jerkiness. "Well, I would have gone Dutch, but then you'd think I was cheap."

Dexter closed the door after him and listened to House wash himself via a sponge bath. Just to be an ass and as revenge for him barging in and asking his insensitive question, Dexter suspected House would leave the bathroom a mess.

When it came Dexters turn to use the facilities, a flood zone of disastrous proportions greeted him. Most towels were on the floor and every one was soaking wet.

House smiled pleasantly as he exited the steamy room. Hos had he managed _that?_ Dexter wondered, sighing.

This was going to be a long, long, _long_ investigation.

XXX


	3. Chapter 3

"Then find out how badly his lungs _aren't_ working. We're trying to find what _is_ the problem, not what _isn't_!"

Dexter opened his eyes and ears to what had greeted him the last few mornings -- Doctor House talking loudly on the phone to one of his employees. In truth, Doctor House rarely ever talked. He mostly yelled, sometimes with obscenities, often sarcastically, and always impatiently. _And I thought LaGuerta was a demanding boss._

Dexter understood House was getting itchy being cooped up in the hotel while Dexter went out everyday to track down information about and clues to Red, his serial killer. Dexter also suspected House was having doubts about the voracity of his theory; that House was a target. House was, more than anything, missing his work. The Doc' was having to neglect his own interesting puzzles. And House was probably missing his social life (though Dexter had seen little evidence of it other than his association with Doctor Wilson).

Dexter slipped his clothes on, contemplating what to do with the antsy doctor and what to do about finding Red without risking House's life in the process. He had a good idea but he'd have to clear it with LaGuerta. Since she had no idea he was conducting an investigation (investigating itself not in fact his line of work in Miami P.D.), out of his jurisdiction, while on vacation, he surmised that conversation would be, for LaGuerta's part, a loud, angry one.

It would still be a refreshing change from her too short for the office skirts and her in-his-face long eyelash leers. Isn't employee/employer sexual harassment suppose to not happen on both sides of the power scale?

Dexter looked at his watch on the side table. "Six-thirty?" He mumbled. As he recalled, he went to bed around midnight, but could see the glow from Doctor House's television set when he woke up sometime after one. He had heard House munching on a middle-of-the-night snack. And smell it -- cheese taco chips. Eccch!

_Doesn't he sleep? _Dexter padded to the his guest's bedroom. Not bothering to knock, "Hey", he said as he opened the door, "don't you ever slee-?"

He stopped short when he saw Doctor House sitting on the edge of the bed, doubled over and clutching at his leg in obvious pain. He was perspiring and had the phone cradled between his right shoulder and ear. "Just do it!" He snarled and tossed the phone back on its cradle, then looked at Dexter. "What? You don't know how to knock?"

Dexter wasn't quite sure how to respond. Apologize for barging in Wilson-like? Offer help? Say good morning? "Um. Breakfast is coming." He stared at House who looked away, rubbing viciously at his thigh. Dexter could see the tiniest rocking back and forth of House's torso. He suddenly couldn't remember what he'd been mad about. "Need some water?"

House tossed back some pills dry, but nodded.

Dexter returned with a glass of water and placed it on the bedside table. House had managed to slip on his jeans and a tee-shirt in the interim and didn't make a move toward the glass. He caught Dexter staring at him. "Haven't you seen anyone in pain before?" House asked.

Dexter didn't answer aloud. _Well, yes. Often, actually. Horrible, blood-letting pain in fact. Sometimes while as an investigator._

House was embarrassed that he had been caught with his pants, and his guard down. "Scram, the circus act is over."

Dexter left the room.

After a few minutes, House joined him in the common room and plopped himself down in front of the television. Dexter imagined he was waiting for the pills to kick in.

Dexter had nothing to offer him in the way of pain relief. "I have to go out for a while. What do you want for breakfast?"

"To go home." House said. Then he sighed and lay his head back on the couch. "Not hungry."

Dexter could hear the mounting frustration in House's voice and see the doubt in his eyes. Dexter knew something was going to have to change and in the next twenty-four hours or he would lose his precarious control on House and, he had no doubt of his own on the matter, lose House to a grisly murder courtesy of Red.

Dexter gathered his wallet, keys and phone. He stood in front of House and effected the most sympathetic but confident face he could manage. "I'm right about this, you know." He told him. "Just give me another day or so."

But House was having none of it. "I think you're wrong." He answered, with equal confidence. "I think the numbers say you must be."

_Uh oh_. His control over House was already vanishing. Dexter bit his lip. He wasn't wrong, but House wasn't stupid. He had no concrete reason to believe he was the only possible potential victim out there.

"You're only right if you're right about the reasons you think I might be the victim." House added. "If you're wrong about any of that, then you're just plain _wrong_."

Logical. But cold logic wasn't all there was to diagnosing a serial murderers cravings. Previous experience and, as unscientific as it was, intuition mattered. And it was always better to err on the side of caution. Or in House's profession-

"--Would you only treat your patient if you knew you were absolute in your analysis of his symptoms? Or would you wait?" Dexter presented his hands, palms up, as though tiny invisible little people stood on each one, being weighed in the scales of life and death. "Would waiting risk his life? Would treatment, even if the treatment is wrong, be worse? Or suppose the treatment is wrong but extends his life?"

House looked up at Dexter with some grudging respect. "I'm tired."

"I know." Dexter's reasoning had done its job. House would give him a little more time now. "Give me twenty-four more hours, and something will change."

"What if it doesn't?"

Dexter opened the door. "Then I make something change."

House stared at him from the couch.

"Lock the door behind me." Dexter instructed. "And order yourself some breakfast. Remember, it's on me."

XXX

It had taken Dexter a good thirty minutes to convince LaGuerta what he wanted to do. "Just make damn sure Miami P.D. isn't implicated in any of this. Because it's your ass on the line here, not mine."

Dexter had almost suggested a date as payment for what she was allowing him to do. "Allowing" meaning turning the other cheek and pretending he wasn't doing anything she knew anything about. Not that he really needed her permission. She had agreed, however, before he'd had to resort to such sly (and ultimately undesirable) tactics. That was even better because if, somewhere down the line, the shit did hit the fan, he could use that as a bargaining tactic to gain her help deflecting said shit a little and hopefully keep his job intact.

What he was doing was only a little bit illegal. And if it fell apart, it wouldn't be as bad as what happened to What-z-name in Where-zitz with his million little pieces.

Dexter called the Tribune, the Jersey Journal, the Bloomburg, the Town Topics and the Packet newspapers for the Princeton and New Jersey areas. He placed his carefully worded Ad in all the subcategories of the Personals sections.

He returned to the hotel room to find House asleep on the couch, dirty breakfast plate and cup on the coffee table. Dexter was glad House was asleep so he would not have to go into it in detail. "It" being his plan to draw Red out. Dexter helped himself to the lukewarm coffee still sitting on the bottom of the decanter, added sugar and cream, sat quietly down in the overstuffed chair opposite the couch and put his feet up on the coffee table. Now all there was to do was wait for a phone call he was sure would come.

Pretty sure.

XXX

House only felt "pretty sure" for about a day. The next morning, despite Dexter's protests, he started thrusting his few clothes, other personals and his Ipod into his back-pack with impatient hands. "I'm going home. I'm going back to work. I have a case. My case is actually sick. He's in danger, the real kind. You know the type, the dying sort of danger."

Dexter considered how to convince House to believe him. "Doctor House. This guy is real. You're his most likely next target. I'm sure of it."

"How sure? Give me a number."

House would spot a lie. Dexter sighed and told him the truth. "Seventy-five percent." It would not be enough to keep House there.

House huffed. "So a one in four chance you might be wrong, even if you're right about all your speculations." House gathered up his pack and cane and limped to the door. "And if you were wrong about any of that, then it's more like two chances in four. And if you were wrong about a lot of it, say half of it, then it's probably one in four." House grabbed the door knob. "My patient's chances aren't _that_ good."

Dexter put a hand up against the door. "Please." Dexter dropped his hand when House held his cane higher like a weapon. "Look." He backed away. "Let me show you something. Then you can go." Dexter motioned for House to join him at the desk and his laptop.

House grudgingly limped to the desk and stood staring at Dexter as he sat and pulled up on his computer what he wanted to share. Dexter knew it was a dirty shot, but maybe if House saw what this guy was capable of, seeing a human that came to his end not by a wasting disease but by a sharp blade in the hands of a psychopath, he might be more cooperative. He might at least _listen_.

Dexter pulled up the most grisly photo's of the crime scenes he had. House, tired of standing on his bad leg, pulled a straight backed chair over with his cane and sat down.

"This man was a data entry worker. Red did him by almost cutting his arms off with a very sharp instrument, scalpel or carpet cutter maybe." He allowed House room to lean in and take a good look. The photo was in full color and the body had been dumped just off to the side of a gravel road. "He was the first killed. He worked at Plainsborough." Dexter left out the more personal details of the young man's life. He suspected House would not be swayed by sentiment or guilt.

Dexter pulled up a succession of photographs, each showing a male body in varying states of partial dismemberment and decomposition. Dexter explained pertinent details so House would get the frame-work of which direction Dexter's theory leaned. "The second victim was a radiologist. He was handi-capped. Born with congenital amputation; shortened arms and legs. He worked at University Medical." Dexter allowed House a moment to see the young man's "grin" -- his throat cut from ear to ear, almost to the spine. The photo was especially gruesome as the victim's blood had so thoroughly drained from his body his skin was white like plaster in contrast with the pinkish interior of the gaping wound.

The next photograph was of a highly decomposed body. "This man was the third victim found but is actually the most recent victim murdered. He was a retired vascular surgeon. Red killed him by cutting into his thighs so deeply he must have bled out in minutes. His body was wrapped in plastic, weighted with rocks and dumped in Lake Carnegie. The third victim I have no photo's of but he was a deaf-mute who worked as a technician at Bio-Design Company called Prosthetica Limited. His chest was hacked open, right through his sternum and heart. Red must have used a wood axe."

"Are you're trying to frighten me into staying?"

"Yes."

House considered. He wanted more convincing. "All these victims were handi-capped."

"All." Dexter answered.

"But, again, there must be hundred's of-"

"-Not like you."

"What the hell is so special about me??"

"Your handi-cap is a ruined _thigh_. You're a _doctor _who is a _leg cripple._ The fourth victim --the _vascular surgeon_ with the dicky heart -- his _thighs_ were sliced into. The third victim --the deaf mute -- his _chest _was hacked open. The second victim -- the radiologist -- his _head_ was nearly severed. The first victim -- a blind data entry worker's _arms_ were almost cut off."

House was listening far more intently now. Dexter knew the man loved a puzzle, so he summed it up for him. "Red's showing us who the next victim is by the way he kills them. Killers, especially serial killers who's agenda is not money but the need to avenge the wrongs against them, want to be noticed, to be admired. The world must acknowledge them as superior, if only by showing that they are a better murderer than most. That's why serial killers, with few exceptions, don't go to any lengths to hide what they do. Dahlmer hid all of it because he _was_ ashamed of what he was.

"Red isn't ashamed, he's furious. He wants his fury, the righteousness in his murdering, to be felt and seen."

"You've answered the why me physically. But not the why _me_? I don't remember humiliating anyone...lately. Not enough to warrant-"

"-you were shot Doctor House."

House set his lip. Nodded. Maybe he really _did _need to change his night club act. The young blood pathologist did have a point. "Can we get to the hospital? I have a case." House said.

Dexter closed the laptop. "I'm trying to teach you something about my business. You argue that I might be wrong, yet you came here so you must have thought I was right to begin with. Or you at least believed me when I said I know my business."

Dexter understood. House could no more stay away from his specialized body work than he could from his. "I've been in this field of study since I was nineteen. I've been with the Miami P.D. since age twenty-three. I'm thirty-four years old and I'm the best full time blood expert and part timer monster hunter in the country." Dexter stood and looked at House. "Check my record if you don't believe me. My boss is Lieutenant LaGuerta."

House stared at Dexter, still annoyed and anxious to go but listening. Dexter had his attention once more. "I have to get to my case, but," House said, he shrugged to Dexter with one hand, "You could hang around there. We have computers. You can bring your gun or tazer or whatever else you need and protect me at the hospital."

Dexter decided it was a good enough compromise. Better than House walking out that door alone. 'Cause that would kill him for sure.

"Let me get packed. We'll go together in my car." Dexter had a thought. "Um, you're friend there, Wilson,..he won't...mind me hanging around,...I mean, with you? Will he?"

At House's blush, Dexter knew he had guessed right about them. "Wilson's not my _keeper_."

Dexter nodded. House and his very close doctor friend. Maybe he could elicit Wilson's help on the side. Four eyes keeping watch over House was better than two.

Dexter quickly gathered his belongings. "Sure. I'll call for my car."

XXX

Doctor House was everything Dexter had read about and then some.

He sat in House;'s office and watched through the glass wall as House lead a "diagnostic differential" with his team of four specialists. House was the conductor and his staff the orchestra.

But where Dexter was quietly ingenious, House was obnoxiously brilliant. Dexter would examine blood spatter, cautiously stepping around other investigators toes. House would limp over, stomp all over the other physicians and ignore their indignant yelps.

Dexter heard snippets of suggestions, counter-suggestions, arguments for and against a plethora of medical jargon relating to House's patient. Much of it House shot down without regard for anyone's ego. Other ideas he praised if a trifle sarcastically. None of his fellowships seemed close to him but it was clear all respected his genius.

House's reputation as a person was circumspect at best. His name as a top level doctor was rightly earned.

Dexter saw the four younger physicians hustle off to do their testing and monitoring of patient "X". House could not remember the person's name or even, at one point, gender. At Dexter's surprise, House threw at him, "It's not a testicle or ovary problem! Patient's bleeding into his bowels. When those start sprouting reproductive organs, I'll worry about sex."

Doctor Wilson entered House's office. When he saw Dexter, he raised his eyebrows and looked a bit askance at him. "Are you--have we met..You're not from Pharmaceuticals?"

Dexter stood, shaking Wilson's hand. "No. I'm Dexter Morgan. I'm helping Doctor House with a little problem--"

"--oh stop being so mysterious." House threw a nod of his head in Dexter's direction. "Dex' is a forensic expert from Miami. Thinks a bad guy's after me."

Wilson looked at House with a tease, "They usually are." But to Dexter. "Is this true?"

Dexter nodded but thought to keep the more gruesome details unspoken for now. "I believe Doctor House could be in danger, yes. I just want to take every precaution to make sure he doesn't become another victim."

Wilson was working hard to keep his reaction very calm and collected but his expression said differently. Dexter could see worry spring instantly to Wilson's wide, dark eyes. Yes, these two, if not involved sexually, were closer than most friends usually were.

"I've got a body guard." House stated simply to Wilson. "Or maybe a gigolo. I can't be sure 'cause he keeps staring at my ass."

Dexter exchanged a smile with Wilson's rolling eyes. Dexter decided he liked this Doctor Wilson. House made good friend choices. "Doctor House should not stay alone at night."

Wilson crossed his arms. "He can stay at my place." Wilson offered, and looked over at House for his agreement or argument. Dexter could already tell that with House, either one was a fair bet.

House sighed heavily. "Fine." He gathered up a few papers, his back pack and cane. "My patient's all snuggled in with the team for the night. So three-some then?" House asked his two companions as they led the way out the door.

Dexter wasn't listening to House's humorous banter. He scanned his mental list of his own pack's items: Cell phone with extra battery, laptop, multi-tool, hunting knife, key's to a large, lighted, rented storage shed (where-in were other items like five hundred square feet of plastic, rolls of grey tape and the particular shiny tools of his trade waited), semi-automatic with extra clip, two syringes of Enflurane and sterile slides.

Dexter would have to bring Wilson up to speed on House's particular predicament, but he felt as ready and as sure as he could be.

Pretty sure.

XXX


	4. Chapter 4

**Dexter in the House.**

Part IV

By GeeLady

Summary: Dexter/House crossover. During his summer vacation, Dexter hunts a New Jersey killer. When he discovers who the next target is, saving him will be harder than he thinks.

Pairing: House/Dexter

Rated: M, NC-17, Mature, Adult! Language. Gore. Murder. Dexter/House Slash**. **

Disclaimer: I like Dexter, he's sexy, but I would never try to abduct him 'cause I hear he has a dark side. And House, well, he just melts my buttons!

_**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**_

_**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**_

House said to Wilson, "Stop at the Super Market. I want some stuff."

Wilson did not want to leave the heavy traffic. "It's going to take hours to get home."

"Stop exaggerating. Does your condo have coke in the fridge? Chocolate bars and taco chips in the cupboard? How about something that passes for real food like steaks or burgers? Or is it waiting to spring on us tofu cakes and ginger water?" House tossed over his shoulder to Dexter, "How about you, Dex'? Want to chow down on bean sprouts and wheat germ tonight? Or did your mother raise you right?"

Dexter decided not to get between the two. "I'm the guest. Whatever's fine."

House huffed. "Wuss." He turned half in his seat to address him, "Just for future reference, Wilson here is a panty waist. He'll do anything you ask as long as you say please and promise to stay away from his Barry Manilow collection."

"House," Wilson said, "You _want_ me to stop for you, right?" Wilson motioned like he was not going to turn off the road into the grocery store parking lot. "Because I could always break out the organic turnips and Jelly-fish cakes-"

"-_Pl-e-e-e-a-se!_" House said and Wilson turned into the large lot crowded with cars, looking for a parking space. After a few turns around the lot, he found one of the few open spaces left far from the main entrance.

House didn't move to undo his seat belt. He looked to his left at Wilson's expectant but slightly puzzled expression. "Well, you don't expect I can walk that far, do the shopping, stand in line, _pay_ for it and walk all the way back here with my arms full of groceries do you?"

Wilson sighed. "No, expecting you to help yourself - how ridiculous of me. What were you planning on doing, buying out the place?" Wilson complained as he stepped out of the car. He was mind enough to poke his head back in and ask Dexter, "You want anything?" Looking at House, "_Him_ maybe?"

Dexter very politely shook his head, then added, "Unless they have a ten foot pole."

It was a hot day and with the car engine off, the air conditioned environment quickly turned sweltering. House reached over, switched Wilson's car key to "Accessory" and rolled down all the power windows.

After Wilson was out of ear shot, "How long have you two known each other?" Dexter asked.

House answered but kept his face forward. "Fourteen _long _years."

"How did you meet?"

House rolled his yes but turned half way around again. "Is this going to be a boring conversation one question at a time?"

A shadow passed across the rear window, blocking the direct heat for only a disappointing few seconds.

Dexter smiled. "Then give me the House version of "My Best Friend Wilson."."

"Wilson's a good doctor, a lousy husband, talented at infidelity, bereft of any true understanding of human nature, and,...a good friend." House had said everything in a half lecturing half mocking tone of voice, save for the last few words.

"And your boyfriend."

House nodded very slightly at that. "Don't tell his mother. She's a nice Jewish woman who thinks her children are still twelve."

"Promise."

House played with his cane, pivoting it back and forth between his hands. "So? Manners dictate I have to sit here and listen while you tell me everything about yourself. Please give me the condensed, non-boring cut, I have an allergy to tedium."

House waited almost a polite interval before, "Hey. I wasn't that rude, was I?" House turned half way around. "You're not crying back there are--"

Dexter was slumped on his left side on the car seat. He appeared asleep.

"Hey-" House reached back with his cane and tapped him. When Dexter did not respond, he realized that maybe the kid had fainted from the heat or maybe a stroke,...then House noticed a tiny spot of blood on the right side of his neck.

To his right, a shadow blocked the sun. House turned around only to find his mouth and nose covered with a cloth and a sweetly overpowering chemical smell entering his lungs. In seconds he felt light-headed, then limp, then sleepy.

Then the edges of parking lot and sky turned charcoal and closed in around him like a dead quiet storm. Finally, the world shrunk to the size of a tiny dot of white. A flickering candle of consciousness.

Then, the hand that had held the cloth and the shadow that had swallowed the day...

...blew out the light.

XXX

"When I got back from the store, my car was gone! How many times do I have to tell you guys the same damn thing?" Wilson threw a useless hand out in the direction of the huge world that had just swallowed House and the Miami guy. "Just get out there and find them!"

In his thirty year career in law enforcement, the patient policeman interviewing the irate witness had heard and seen pretty well everything New Jersey could drudge up crime-wise. This was not sounding like a crime.

"Doctor Wilson, we checked the scene. There was no blood, no sign of any struggle. No one else we've spoken to at the Super-Save saw anything unusual."

"Someone has taken them." Wilson could not understand why this cop wasn't listening. "Why would my best friend take off without telling me? In _my_ car? Leaving me stranded with _his_ groceries? What you're suggesting doesn't make sense."

What the cop was thinking he had spoken yet. Only suspected. This Wilson looked very upset. Too upset for a missing colleague, too upset even for a friend. So... "Are you two, he and you,..are you "involved"?"

Wilson choked on the rude response that immediately came to mind. "What the hell difference does that make?"

Cop's expression said _I thought so. _ He looked at his notes thus far, Things were shaping up to be what he had figured from the beginning. "And this other fella? Dexter? He's a new friend of " -- he checked his previous note on the names involved -- "Greg House's?"

"Yes. He was a pathologist from Miami. He came here-"

"-I got that part. A blood expert on vacation here to track down a serial killer. Kind of a hobby?"

Wilson's heart was sinking deeper and deeper with every passing minute. _The son-of-a-bitch doesn't believe me. He isn't taking me seriously at all._

"You've got to believe me. Talk to Lisa Cuddy. She's our boss at Princeton Plainsborough Hospital. She'll vouch for this."

"Was she there?"

"She'll vouch for his _character_. House wouldn't just take off without a word."

"And what about this other guy? What do you know about _his_ character?"

Wilson had to admit it. "Next to nothing." _Fuck!_

"So this House, your boyfriend, has a new friend in town from Miami. A guy you don't really know very well,...maybe they just decided to-"

Wilson turned pale then crimson. "House would never-"

"-Really? You're absolutely sure about that? You know for a _fact_ Doctor House is completely free from infidelity? There's no doubt what-so-ever in your mind? Because, if you ask me, no one can know another person that well. Not _everything_, not _every_ thought or..._urge_."

Wilson rubbed his face in his hands. Stacy. _Jesus._ House had slept with a married woman once. Or twice maybe. But House had been in love with Stacy, right? That was the difference.

House wasn't in love with this Dexter guy. They hadn't known each other long enough for that. Or...

...Had House ever gone to Miami before? Wilson didn't know. He was pretty sure House hadn't gone anywhere, really, since the infarction.

"House wouldn't do that." But Wilson sounded less convinced than at first. He was tired of the questions and the cop's apathetic attitude. House just might be getting murdered as the guy stood there looking down over his round belly at Wilson. "My god..." Wilson whispered.

House and Dexter? No. He refused to consider it.

"My friend -- my _boyfriend_ has been kidnaped - along with a law enforcement investigator -- one of _your_ people. Now, how many more hours are you going to stand there thinking of donuts, doing _shit_?"

"Watch your mouth. We'll do an investigation. You want that investigation to go well, you'll answer every question and drop the smart ass routine. We'll all go and see your boss. We've called Miami P.D. to get the scoop on the other guy."

Wilson nodded weakly and the cop turned away to discuss a few things with his partner.

Wilson watched the sun get low in the sky as the cops talked and time moved, relentlessly, forward. He almost wished House and Dexter were off staining the sheets in some cheap hotel.

But that's not what was happening. The parking lot was emptying out. The cop who had spoken to him motioned for him to get in the back of his squad car. Wilson complied, heart-sick. He looked at his watch. Saturday evening. WWW - television wrestling night for House. Or making love night.

Dexter had explained what the murderer did. Cutting his victims. Watching them suffer. Raping them. Seeing them bleed out until they were empty. Like draining oil from a car engine.

A necessity, Dexter had said, for the killer.

Wilson sat silently in the rear seat, urging the car to go faster.

XXX

Stink was the first thing he was aware of. And pain.

House opened his eyes to darkness, a cold, rough floor. His hands were trapped in metal wrist cuffs chained together by three inches of links. His ankles were similarly bound.

The stink was himself. In the time between when he lost consciousness and woke up in the cold dark, he had soiled himself. Not an uncommon physical response to being drugged into a temporary oblivion. Lying in ones own shit inside one's own underwear was not a comfortable state. He'd peed himself too.

When his eyes began to adjust to the darkness, he saw that it was not completely dark. A thin shaft of light spilled through a crack in what he assumed was the door into whatever kind of room this was.

His leg was killing him. As best he could he felt his shirt pocket for the familiar shape of his pill bottle, coming up empty. "Great."

"House?"

Dexter's voice from nearby.

"Were are you?" House whispered, coughing. His throat was parched.

"The other side of the room I think." Dexter cleared his throat also. "I also think we are in very big trouble."

"Yeah," House managed a respectable level of sarcasm, though he couldn't keep the tremor from his voice, "I kinda' gathered that. Some investigator."

"We'll be all right." Dexter knew it was a useless reassurance. He couldn't guarantee that at all. Not until he understood the killer, then they might-

"--Wilson'll be stroking out by now."

Dexter listened with only half attention as he looked around the dim room. Plaster walls, concrete floor. Drain in the center of the floor. Laundry room? A house or townhouse maybe. This was not his killer's M.O. at all. What the hell was going on?

Dexter knew he would need to distract House. He also needed to know more about him. Before their host returned.

"House. Tell me about your cases that were failures."

"I only had two or three."

_Impressive. "_Tell me about them."

"Why?"

"Because this guy has it in for you and if I want to save your ass and mine, I need to understand him."

"Fuck understanding him! His a freak."

"A freak who's going to cut you up. And me too, if I can't learn enough about him. I have to know who he is and he's not in the room. I can't interview someone who isn't in the room. So I have to know more about you."

House could feel the effects of his last Vicodin wearing thin. He was cold, lying prone on his side on a hard concrete floor in what basically amounted to a cell. He was smeared in his own piss and shit.

As though reading is mind, "This isn't the time for comedy, House." Dexter urged.

House lay his head down on the rough surface, feeling the chill creeping in, the uneven surface hinting at the horrible night he was about to have. The smell of his own sweat and fear. "What do you want to know?"

XXX

LaGuerta had driven up personally when she heard about Dexter's disappearance. She was not pleased with the level of cooperation from the local police thus far. Not that they had any obligation to cooperate. "All I'm asking for is professional courtesy." She said to cop number one, Wilson's previous interviewer. "Assign a couple detectives to help us find our guy and yours, or sign jurisdiction on this one over to me."

Lisa Cuddy's office was crowded with bodies, all making their points in loud voices. She stood and shouted above them, flipping her raven hair around like a whip. "Can we all just talk like civilized people please?" When she finally had their collective attention, "Everybody sit down."

LaGuerta made herself comfortable opposite Cuddy's desk. Doakes and Angel found spots on her couch. Wilson sat slumped in her square easy chair.

LaGuerta took the floor. "Dexter Morgan would not have come here with a bull shit story about a killer. What? -- you think he doesn't have enough of a case load at home? That he has to invent work?" She looked over at Doakes, challenging him to refute her. When he didn't, "If Dexter said he thought there was a killer here, there was one. _Is_ one."

Doakes, who had arrived at Plainsborough first and gotten the story from the officer on scene, spoke up now. "Lieutenant, Dexter and this doctor might just be off banging in some hotel room somewhere." At her mixture of anger and disbelief, he added "Not my words, okay? Doctor Wilson and House were..._dating." _

Wilson stole a guilty look at Cuddy, who's face registered her disbelief. "You can explain to me later why you failed to mentioned that." She scolded him. Employee relationships were not forbidden but certainly discouraged.

He defended himself. "Because it's only been a few months." He rubbed his forehead until it hurt. "I didn't want to say anything until we were sure."

LaGuerta crossed her arms. "How long have you known House?"

"About fourteen years. Look - why does that matter? It doesn't make him any less kidnaped."

"But only having sex a few months?"

Wilson suddenly felt like the central antagonist in a bad soap opera. "It's more than sex. And so what?!"

The pot bellied cop who first interviewed Wilson spoke up. "Look, Lieutenant. If your department wants this case," He spoke the last words in doubting quotes, "be my guest. Call the chief. But the fact is this could just be two love-birds on a quickie rendevous. Don't forget they were both on vacation time. They'll probably show up by tomorrow morning walking funny."

Wilson wanted to spring up and deck the guy. But LaGuerta wasn't finished. "Watch you mouth, officer. Dexter Morgan happens to be a valued member of my department. He's a first class blood pathologist. He doesn't do anything piece-meal. I for one think there might be something more going on here."

_Finally! _Wilson still felt like he'd been gut shot. "Can someone _please_ start looking for them?"

Tubby cop said, "We've already put out an A.P.B. on your car and its occupants."

"My car? Oh good! _That'll_ stop the killer." Wilson shook his head. It was all unbelievable.

"Doctor Wilson." LaGuerta tried to show some sympathy. "We understand your worry. But the facts are, I've already spoken with the New Jersey police department and no one here is tracking a serial killer. These murders you say Dexter claimed to be connected, according to the N.J. experts, have no connection. Random killings."

Wilson stared back at her, his guts twisted in fear for House and his protector. "So that's it? House just meets a new guy, takes my car -- which he can't drive by the way because it's a standard -- and runs off to Vegas? House wouldn't do that. House _doesn't _do that. He's not a thief or a cheater."

Doakes cleared his throat. "You're sure about that?" He asked a sick looking Wilson. "You're absolutely positive that House would never just take off? Cheat on you? He's never just absconded with something that belongs to you?" Wilson shivered from the cold echo of words the pot-bellied cop had said. Do cops all think alike?

"Ever?" Doakes was still asking, doubting... "He's never committed an act of infidelity? Never looked at another...guy?"

Wilson was sick of their ignorance. "Yes, House is loyal. As to the other...yes, House occasionally has...taken things but-"

"-Taken?" The cop the other cop called Angel, asked, "As in stole?"

Wilson felt his stomach churning. His heart ached to make them understand.

"On what evidence do you think Doctor House was at risk for a killer?" The cop called Doakes asked.

Wilson thought they had already gone over this part. "Your guy's word, Dexter. He said so."

"He went into detail? Explained his thinking on it?" LaGuerta asked.

"Well, no, but he was sure-"

"-So, other than the word of Dexter and House -- whom you said seemed to be getting along -- you have nothing else to add that might make us believe this is more than just two guys with the hots for each other taking the opportunity to disappear for a couple days?" LaGuerta summed up.

Wilson felt like his arms and legs were made of lead. "Seems a pretty elaborate lie to get a date."

"Maybe House didn't want you thinking he was hot for the guy? Maybe he's just trying to spare your feelings?" Angel, not unkindly, suggested.

"Yeah." Wilson laughed ironically. "I'm feeling very _spared_."

Doakes gave the floor to his lieutenant who, although she liked Dexter Morgan, by her face had come to the conclusion that Doakes' theory was at least a possibility.

"Doctor Cuddy" She turned to the Administrator. "Did you meet or speak with Dexter Morgan other than during his initial visit to arrange a meeting with Doctor House?"

Cuddy hated to do it but she shook her head. "No." She said regretfully. "I only spoke with Mister Morgan for a moment. I know nothing of their conversations together." Her face was an apology to Wilson. "I didn't know any of this until Doctor Wilson phoned me about them going missing."

"I'd like to interview House's colleagues-" LaGuerta said.

"That'd be his fellowships." Cuddy explained and picked up the phone to call for them.

At LaGuerta's questions, all responded in the negative. They had all _seen_ Dexter with Doctor House in House's office, but not spoken with the visitor.

Doakes re-opened his theory. "Lieutenant, this might be just a lover's triangle. A snow-blow-job gone to hell."

Wilson bristled at the cop's crude terminology. "That's not like House at all!"

"Yeah?" Doakes challenged, tired of Doctor Wilson's assertion that Doctor House was an angel in disguise. "Not from what I've learned of the man. I made a few calls, Lieutenant." He addressed his boss. "Last year House was charged with intent to traffic-"

"-Those charges were thrown out. It never made it to trial." Wilson said sharply.

His face was tight with anger as Doakes all but dismantled House's character before the group of mostly strangers. "And," Doakes continued, "resisting arrest. House has been sued for endangering patients, he's a known drug addict-"

"-He takes those pills for pain!" Wilson pleaded with Doakes, and with his Lieutenant and with the room full of people all having doubts on their faces for Wilson and eyes looking to Doakes' very reasonable sounding words.

"House disregards regulations, he's arrogant." Doakes drummed his fingers on the couch's arm, adding his final nail, "And he's a drunk."

Wilson felt like he was in free fall. The list of infractions and behaviors made House sound like someone they all oughta' be happy to let stay gone. With just a few paltry sentences, Doakes had transformed House from a world renowned Diagnostician into a first class loser.

Doakes summed up his theory for the class. "So you, Doctor Wilson, without a shadow of a doubt, _know_ Doctor House has not just taken off with his new boy toy for a romp or two? Even if it's just because he was on a drug-fed high?"

Wilson, stomach heaving, did not answer the hated cop. But the question, incredible to his own ears, still had the power to make him think about it. Most of the things the cop had mentioned were true. Some after a fashion. Some absolutely.

No, he was not a hundred percent certain about House's fidelity. When Stacy came back, House had seemed not to care a lick what his affair with her had put Mark Warner through, even though it closely resembled what House himself had endured during his break-up with her. Was House a loyal man or not? Would he cheat if it suited him?

Wilson himself had cheated on two of his three wives, yet he considered himself an ethical man and loyal friend. Just a lousy husband. Is two out of three a mark of good character? Is anyone really consistently good?

Who hath not sinned? Cast the first stone.

But Wilson also knew, not after a fashion but absolutely, that House was one of the most moral men he had ever known. Crude jokes and jests, sleeping with a married woman aside, whatever House did, he tried to make it the right thing. House had refused to endorse a pharmaceutical product even though it cost his boss millions. Or House his job. House had declined a sure fuck with a pretty young allergist just because she was puppy-love-sick and wanted to stroke him until he was healed.

Perhaps what was right was subjective. But at the broadest end of the measuring stick, Wilson had never seen House go out of his way to be deliberately cruel to anyone. When he was in his right mind.

Wilson knew he would not be able to say any of this to the couch cop with the plausible theory. Not so the guy or any of them except Cuddy, would believe it. The Aye's were in short supply.

How do you convince another about your gut feeling that your lover isn't just off screwing his new boyfriend but is in mortal danger? How does one, really, in a few words, sum up the depths and layers that make up your closest companion to a total stranger? And that you _know_ if he isn't found soon -- he'll die?

Wilson looked over at the skeptical cop, at Cuddy, her face twisted in sympathy and fear, and finally to LaGuerta's cool composure. He had no chips left. Conquered by it; exhausted, Wilson said in a weak whisper. "I think you're wrong."

XXX

Part V coming soon!


	5. Chapter 5

**Dexter in the House. **

**Part V**

By GeeLady

Summary: Dexter/House crossover. During his summer vacation, Dexter hunts a New Jersey killer. When he discovers who the next target is, saving him will be harder than he thinks.

Pairing: House/Dexter

Rated: M, NC-17, Mature, Adult! Language. Gore. Murder. Dexter/House Slash**. ****Here****, gentle readers, is where the harsher stuff begins. **_**Dark themes, disturbing scenes. **_**If you ****do not**** want to read about torture or rape **--_**stop! .**_

Disclaimer: I like Dexter, he's sexy, but I would never try to abduct him 'cause I hear he has a dark side. And House, well, he just melts my buttons!

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Dexter thought maybe he knew how the guy had found them. His advertisement would have been printed that morning. Red would have read it. Understood its meaning.

But Dexter had under-estimated his killer. Instead of taking the bait and calling or responding via the papers, he had familiarized himself with House's closest associates.

Red had followed Wilson. Learned those things Dexter had learned. Red had been following them probably for days.

It had been a stupid error. But this killer wasn't following an expected pattern either. He wasn't killing people of similar physical type an he was killing all ages. He was letting the world know (though the world had failed to recognize it) that while murdering one victim, he had another in mind.

Dexter shifted his sore muscles on the hard floor. Thus far he had been correct in his profile of the New Jersey killer.

It was only his precautions to protect Doctor House that had turned out less than successful.

Dexter shifted again. If he was feeling the discomfort to this degree, what was House feeling with his bad leg and lack of pain pills? "House...you awake?"

House sighed heavily. In fact he was breathing quite fast. "Yeah."

He sounded bad. "Those pills for the leg, Red took them?"

"Yeah."

"What are they?"

"Vicodin."

So House was going to be entering a phase of detox soon. "I should have anticipated this move, Red's following Wilson."

"Maybe it's a good thing you don't think like a psycho."

"Mmm." Dexter shifted again, rolling over until he was able to sit up on his backside. He scooted over to House, whose form he could make out in the dark room, so he could speak quietly, beyond any possibility that Red could hear him. "I know almost I all I need to know to profile this guy."

His tone suggesting mockery, "I thought profiling was something you did before the killer actually catches the victim?"

House's sarcasm wasn't lost of Dexter, but he had other things to chew over. "That's usually how it goes." He grunted, trying to get comfortable. "But occasionally, I end up tracking someone's who's smarter than me. Or luckier."

"I hope this guy's smarter, because my luck sucks." House sat up too, his voice strained.

He was in pain. "He's not smarter. I underestimated him."

"I figured. Try not to do that again."

"Have you thought of any other cases?"

House didn't hesitate, "No. I didn't meet that many of my patients. There hasn't been anyone I screwed over -- medically speaking -- badly enough who'd want to get back at me this badly. Well, except for the guy who shot me."

"But you said you didn't know him."

"Life's little ironies." He'd had lots of antagonistic patients over the years, but he had helped them, not hurt them. Saved them. "The only ones I hurt badly enough to want to kill me are the ones I couldn't save. And _they_ don't want to hurt me 'cause they're dead."

Footsteps out side the door halted any more run-through's of House's memories.

House felt his heart leap to his throat, choking off sarcasm and memory itself.

The door didn't open right away. Instead was heard the jangle of keys and many sliding bolts being drawn aside. Dexter was glad. He needed the few more seconds to make sure of something. Dexter whispered in the dark, right into House's ear. "He won't kill you yet." As soft as his voice was, the words contained steel and authority. "He _**won't**_."

House wasn't convinced. He answered in a soft, uncertain, wavering voice, "You don't know that." Pictures ran through his mind. Dexter's research photo's. Victims with slashed throats, gutted torsos. Bodies dumped to rot in the sun or the water.

"Yes, I do. I _know_ because he's not following his M.O. Believe me, he won't kill you."

"He killed the others quickly. You said it."

"But he won't this time."

"What _will _he do?"

There was where Dexter's knowledge hit a road-block. "I'm not sure..."

The door finally swung open with a heavy groan. The thing was made from heavy two by sixes. Psycho Red had taken no chances on their escaping. He reached for something on the outside wall and the room was flooded with light. His prisoners squinted in pain.

Red was wearing a black balaclava and entered with gun drawn. He was clutching it tightly, his fingers white.

Dexter noted it. Red preferred knives. He didn't like the gun. He didn't like using it. Red was unsure of it in his hands. He was like a man starting a new job, untrained in its tools. Uncertain in action.

Red placed a bucket, towel and some clothes on the floor. He crouched down and, all the while keeping the gun trained on Houses head, reached over very slowly, un-locking Houses ankle cuffs with one hand.

Red seemed adept at that particular action. Dexter tucked all the new facts into his mental Red file. He'd correlate later.

"Clean up."

House heard a normal voice. Nothing sinister, nothing off of a late night creep show. A garage mechanic. Post-man. Guy who hooks up your cable.

"And put these clothes on."

House waited for his captor to unlock his wrist cuffs, but he didn't.

"Hurry up!"

House quickly realised that he was going to have stand, undress, wash his own butt and crotch and somehow put on the new clothes with his wrists cuffed in front of him.

House also quickly discerned the guy was going stay and watch.

House, with effort, managed to get himself halfway to his feet using his elbows and knees. Then pushing off with his good leg, he was able to get his left foot under him and make it to his feet.

He managed to slip his feces soiled jeans and boxers off, but the wrist cuffs made removing his shirt impossible.

Red realized the same and waved the gun, indicating House hold out his arms. When he complied, Red, with his free hands, pulled a very sharp knife out of his back pocket.

House was terrified the guy was going to hack his hands off. But instead Red stepped just close enough to maneuver the blade under his shirt cuff and cut away the sleeve. He repeated the action with the other. "Un button." Red ordered. House did and the shredded shirt fell to the floor. He shivered in the bare room.

Red looked House up and down for a few seconds, then pointed to the bucket with the barrel of the gun. "Wash."

House found a sponge in the soapy water. Glad the water was warm at least he did his best to clean up.

"Enough." Red barked. "Get dressed."

House managed the baggy cotton pants. Button up, no belt. But because of the wrist cuffs, the shirt defeated him.

"Sit down." Red ordered.

Down was faster than up, but it hurt more. House had to half crouch half fall to the floor, landing on the concrete on his backside. A sharp pain darted up his left side.

Red ignored Houses gasp and ordered him to put his feet together. When Red had the ankle cuffs on him again, he unlocked Houses wrist restraints so House could put the shirt on. It was another baggy, generic affair, probably from Red's own closet. The thought made his skin crawl.

Once House was fully dressed, Red locked his hands together again.

Red repeated the whole series of methodical actions with Dexter, who by now had peed himself too.

Red, recognizing Dexter as the younger and stronger of his two prisoners, was especially careful to keep the gun trained on him yet stay out of reach. With Dexter, he tossed him the ankle cuff keys, which Dexter used to unlock his restraints and tossed them back. May as well cooperate for now. Dexter was discouraged to see that Red had been smart enough to use different pad-locks on either sets of cuffs.

Red waited for Dexter to wash and dry, put the clean pants on, then the wrist cuffs off and the same tedious routine was followed for Dexters old and new shirt.

House waited for what came next, wondered if he had just dressed for his own funeral.

But Red simply left the room and closed and locked the heavy door. His footsteps retreated and all was quiet again.

The light was left on. "Did you recognize him?" Dexter asked.

House said sharply, his leg making it difficult to think or use his inside voice. "You mean his _eyes_? **No**!"

Dexter rested his head against the floor, watching House sweat and grimace. He was detoxing now and, in light of the forced jumping around on one good leg, in worse pain.

"How did you know he wasn't going to kill me?"

"It was fifty-fifty, actually."

House stared at him, his mouth open. "You mean you didn't know?"

"No. But I do now."

"Then I feel totally okay about it." Not really. "You son-of-a-bitch." House closed his eyes.

Dexter understood. House was in pain, tired, and scared.

"Why didn't you tell me?" House sounded sleepy.

"If he was going to kill you, would it have made a difference?"

"What about his,.." House searched for the word in his tired brain, "..."M.O"?"

"I'm right about that. And now a I know more."

"So, you'll be sixty-forty next time he comes in here with a knife?"

"Red's sick. I diagnose people with his particular illness. He's a serial killer and until now he's been fairly consistent in his pathology..." House heard his own words spoken to him. "But something's changed."

"What?"

"Red's conflicted." Dexter looked over at House who was lying on his side facing him, his tired, blood-shot eyes open. "You. You're what's changed."

House sighed, licked his lips. Red had brought them clean clothes and a wash bucket but seemed to have forgotten all about water and food. "What does that mean?"

"Red wore a mask. If he was going to kill you, if he had made the decision already, why bother with a mask? We won't be alive to identify him. But he's hiding his face. So he not sure whether he wants to kill you. This is good."

House nodded, then stopped when he felt tiny grains of hard concrete irritating his left ear. "Not dying yet. Always good."

XXX

LaGuerta and Cuddy had Foreman and Wilson going through House's past medical cases, looking for possible suspects. Angel had Dexter's computer files faxed to Cuddy's office and he searched through them trying to find any information and, hopefully, Dexter's profile on the so-called "New Jersey Cutter" -- LaGuerta's moniker for the shadow killer.

Cuddy was sick with worry for House but she still had a hospital to run. "Wilson. Once you're done with the files, you and Foreman get on House's case. There's still a sick man to attend to."

Wilson almost whined. "I want to help to help find House."

He had not made it a request. Cuddy steered him by the elbow into House's office, an ominously quiet refuge. "I understand. You're...involved with House. You're scared for him. No different here. But you heard the Lieutenant, House and Mister Morgan might not be "missing" missing. How ever much you'd like to ignore the possibility, House and Morgan could just be-"

Wilson spoke sharply, forcing it out between grinding teeth. "-House would not _**do**_ that!"

Cuddy's face flashed from anger to frustration to sympathy. "You're probably right. But the police are doing everything they can,.." And back to fear for House, "...to find him and their officer. In the meantime you have work to do, and so do I."

Wilson looked at the floor, shaking his head from side to side. Every hour that passed, the knot of fear in his stomach tightened and grew. "House is going to die while we sit here." He said to her.

Cuddy refused to believe him and as much escaped in words. "Go do your job. We have patients."

XXX

"Get up."

The Masked Maniac had returned.

House looked to Dexter for ...he didn't know. Dexter could give him nothing. But He saw Dexter silently mouth the words_: He won't kill you._

This time House felt far less assured. His chest tight, his heart hammering, he scrambled to his feet as fast as hand and leg irons (and a bum leg) would allow.

Red waved the gun. "Move."

House hobbled out the door, out of the bare room into a hallway that appeared as any hallway would in any normal dwelling. He was led to a larger room with black grease streaked white walls. Another normal, wood door, presently closed, lead out and away from Red's horror show. There was probably a park nearby. Kids played. Moms drinking their Starbucks and talking about their renovations.

"Sit there." Red indicated a straight backed, arm-rest-free metal and plastic chair that was bolted to the floor. House tried not to imagine why Red did not want to risk a wobbly chair.

House sat obediently, wondering if at this point if it might be better to scream, beg, or mock the guy who was about to cut him up. Only when House had sat down and Red had locked his leg irons to the metal cross railings of the chair did he notice a rough make-shift low shelf cluttered with tools.

House looked closer. Knives. Not tools.

Looked like Dexter was wrong. Really, the situation demanded that Dexter was wrong. The math fit even.

Dexter, man in shackles who only knows a little about killer...

Is equal to or less than...

Insane murderer, free with a big knife in hand, totally knows what he wants.

Can't argue with the formula. Numbers never lie.

People sometimes won over the numbers. But the outcome could not be predicted when the numbers were not constant. Defy the odds and win and you were Stretching the envelope.

Defy them and lose and you'd had a Death-Wish.

Red took a three foot length of chain and, grabbing Houses hands, roughly passed it through the wrist cuffs. Hauling hard on the chain, he lifted Houses arms over his head and attached the other end of the chained to the metal back of the chair until Houses arms were held in place behind his head. The position hurt.

"Take your clothes off. All of them." Red demanded suddenly, jerking House out of his day-dreaming, frightened mind.

When Red remembered House was all but immobile and could not do what he asked, Red very carefully stepped close to House with his knife.

House, sure that he was about to die, could think of nothing to say. He couldn't even come up with a last poignant thought. _I hope they catch and kill this fuck!_

Yeah, that was a good last thought. Perfect fit.

But Red didn't slash his throat or drive the knife into his chest. He carefully maneuvered the tip of the knife beneath House's shirt sleeve, blade-side-up, and began to slice. The sound of ripping and tearing filled the room for a few moments. Red finished with the shirt and cut his pants off also, one leg at a time.

The unexpected, violating act itself felt like a bleeding wound. It was tantamount to being massaged with liquid mercury or rat poison. House shuddered and wanted to vomit. Too bad his stomach was empty.

Red took his time cutting off Houses clothes. His gasps of putrid bad breath were fast and irregular. He was getting off on it. Then he just let the shreds of material fall away to the dirty floor.

House never felt more frightened in his whole life

Red stepped back and surveyed his work, raking his eyes slowly over House from head to feet. House was certain the sicko's eyes had left behind ugly marks and trails of slime.

Satisfied that his human object wasn't going anywhere, Red turned back to his rough shelf - wooden plank set up on stacked paint cans -- and lovingly picked up a larger, very sharp hunting knife, it's edge scratched dull with having recently been sharpened. Red stood in front of House and ran his thumb along the blade. He flinched then licked off the swelling bead of blood from the tiny cut.

He went to a small beer cooler, pulled out a can of Brew and cracked the tab, taking several refreshing swallows. He offered nothing to House.

This was, House thought, his opening act. This was pre-op. House was dizzy from cold and pain. Nausea and aches from his detoxing threatened to overwhelm his resolve not to scream or weep of even struggle. In fact, he wondered if he was going to pass out. And all the while, on top of every emotion and thought, was the fear threatening to twist his mind into over-drive. It would be so easy to just scream and thrash. Red would slice him and this would be over. Or he would at least spiral down into his own little corner of insanity and forget he was chained to a chair. Or even in the room.

House was surprised at himself. He thought that approaching death, when it did finally come, would not bother him that much. Easy to intellectualize it - talk of statistics and random chance from the safety of his office.

How very different when it confronts you face to face in the form of a blood-thirsty stranger about to slice your throat open with his favorite Gerber.

House was shocked to discover outrage instead of reason there in his mind. The end of yourself was imminent. The finality of dying was stark and personal.

No more _you_.

No amount of philosophical vacillating or Darwin-like acceptance prepares you for it. Your last breath, heartbeat, thought, wish is a lifetime, however brief, unto itself.

It crashed against religious certitude, crumbling it like violent ocean beating on established, ancient cliffs.

Red put the knife at Houses throat.

House closed his eyes, took a breath and held it.

But Red didn't cut into him.

Red's voice, however, "You've got a nice set, Doctor House."

House opened his eyes and, for the first time since the circus of the insane began, looked into Reds eyes. Was the freak going to kill him or not?

Reds look drifted down to House below the waist. Again that feeling of slime crawling in their wake. "Your balls." Red said crudely. "Nice. Firm, round, pink. Full of blood. I'll bet they've held that cock up to plenty of pussy and dick."

House swallowed a growing lump of terror. This was somehow worse. Much, much worse, than the knife.

"Hey?" Red continued. It was a monologue. Red wasn't looking for a conversation over Buds. "Hmm? You've done it both ways I'm sure. College educated man like you?"

House tried to stop it from happening, but his whole body began to tremble.

Without warning, Red snapped open his fly and un-zipped. He stuck one hand down the front of his pants, stroking himself a few times.

Then he dropped to his knees in front of House. House could smell his breath and his unwashed hair, the combination making him retch. Nothing came up.

"I'm going to suck you off, Doctor House. Diagnose _that _youprick!"

_**XXX**_

_**Part VI coming soon.**_


	6. Chapter 6

**Dexter in the House. **

**Part VI**

By GeeLady

Summary: Dexter/House crossover. During his summer vacation, Dexter hunts a New Jersey killer. When he discovers who the next target is, saving him will be harder than he thinks.

Pairing: House/Dexter

Rated: M, NC-17, Mature, Adult! Language. Gore. Murder. Dexter/House Slash**. ****Here****, gentle readers, is where the harsher stuff begins. **_**Dark themes, disturbing scenes. **_**If you ****do not**** want to read about torture or rape **--_**stop! .**_

Disclaimer: I like Dexter, he's sexy, but I would never try to abduct him 'cause I hear he has a dark side. And House, well, he just melts my buttons!

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_**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**_

_**I was sorry that Doctor House had to go through that door and into Red's work shop. I think he'll be alive at the end of today. At least his body will be. Not sure about the rest of him. House is a tough character. Most stressful days I don't think would faze him. But present circumstances are not most days. House will soon learn a lot about himself. Just how tough he is. Or will need to be..**_

House wanted to vomit but after two days without food, his stomach was empty.

He wanted to run, but his shackles rattled uselessly.

Scream but fear of the knife cut his voice off at the source.

House wanted to beg his captor not to touch him. Not like that. Not _there._

But Red the murderer ignored him, lay the sharp Gerber (sharp enough to slice thick deer skin and cut through tough sinew) against his left testicle. House understood its meaning. Move and get castrated. Don't move and have a serial killer suck your dick. Presented with no other choices, House closed his eyes, willing the hated experience to warp to a speedy finish.

Red took House's penis in his mouth and swallowed.

But Red didn't keep swallowing. What he did was suck and lick and roll until House, despite all mental effort to prevent it, reached the pinnacle of impending orgasm.

Then Red spit the cock out, stood up and looked down at House and his ebbing erection. Red enjoyed for a minute the confusion and fear on his victims face.

House sweated and gagged, a storm on the inside. On the outside he sat perfectly still, mute from expectations of worse.

Red did not disappoint him. He pulled out his own limp dick, put the knife under House's left ear and barked, "Your turn. For your necks sake, no nips, no teeth. And make it good. _Real_ good."

Urine stink invaded his nose. House could see four inches of flesh flopping from a nest of black hair and wondered if throwing up would be acceptable foreplay.

Red's knife tapped below his left ear, offering adamant encouragement.

House took the sickening sprout in his mouth and, in between nauseated gags, sucked until his jaw ached.

Red, hardly a stiffening of the little wiener to show for it, suddenly pulled away and with a snarl, hauled back and slapped House hard across the face. Three more even meaner blows landed in rapid succession. Until House's head spun and his ears buzzed.

House gulped for air at the sudden violence of the attack, stunned, his eyes seeing nothing but flashes of red and white.

"You fucking thief!" Red yelled. "Incompetent sons-a-bitches!" Red hit him again, a crack across the side of his skull.

House almost lost consciousness, but managed to keep his wits even though his head was killing him and his brain felt like it had been used as a soccer ball.

-

-

A few more hard slaps and Red had half walked, half dragged House back to the prison room and without a word dumped him.

Once Red was gone, Dexter did only a visual examination of the man, allowing House a few minutes to settle himself and get comfortable on the concrete floor (as settled and comfortable as man who's just been raped and beaten can get), before questioning him.

After those few minutes, which House spent gagging and coughing up phlegm in a vain attempt to clear whatever was in his throat, Houses breathing settled from rasping chokes to something a little less alarming. Recent unpleasantness experienced by House aside, Dexter had to know more about Red.

House broke the silence first. "Aren't you going to reassure me some more?"

Nothing he answered would help of course. Red had done some damage. Only the beginning of damage and they both knew it. "I'm sorry." Dexter offered lamely.

When House's gagging eased and his breathing evened out, "What did you see?" Dexter asked.

House wasn't entirely sure he wanted to divulge any of it. He'd prefer to wipe the whole thing from his mind and taste buds. "Aside from a face full of belly hair?"

As gentle as he could, but urgently too. "This is important. I need to know."

"What? What shit do you need to know about that fuck?"

Dexter questioned and listened while House described his hour long ordeal in Red's work-shop. He interrupted Houses broken narrative,"So he...performed on you, but didn't...finish?"

"No, he didn't finish and I've got the blue balls to prove it."

Dexter understood. House was using humor to replace something that might make him scream later.

"Anything else?"

House coughed and sighed. "Then he made me..."

Dexter spared him from having to go into too many details. "Did he make you...go all the way?"

At the memory, House gagged and coughed again. He shook his head. "I tried not to, _believe me_. He could hardly get it up...it pissed him off."

"That you didn't or that he couldn't?"

"What the fuck's the difference?"

"Under the present circumstances I can understand that you might not be thinking like a doctor."

House looked at him sharply. When he spoke next, the Diagnostician was back. "I don't think he could. He was frustrated by it and hit me a few times to make it clear." House thought for a moment. "And he went to the bathroom first. Peed. But in fits and starts. He had to strain." House summed up his diagnosis -- "Prostate trouble."

"You sure about that?"

"Well I can diagnose that someone's having gastrointestinal pain if they hold their stomach and yell. But prostate's a little tougher unless you make a _way_ closer examination. But, by my ears, yes, I think that's his problem." House, talking mostly to himself, added, "Not infection, no fever..."

Dexter figured House being forced to swallow the guy's dick would have provided the doctor with those specifics.

House added. "No _visual_ signs of swelling in the testes, though I didn't ask him to turn his head and cough."

"That tells us something." Dexter said.

Again it was curious that House would hear his own often spoken words said back to him.

"Not sure what yet." Dexter considered. He was curious and, though he would never admit it aloud, fascinated by this new member of his own peculiar sub-species.

"Red isn't following the recipe anymore."

"You make this psycho sound like fucking a pastry chef. Like he's your cousin from Vermont."

"Sorry. Occupational hazzard." Dexter figured it might be wise to keep his more idle musings to himself in the future. "I mean his MO. has changed. But I think his signature won't. The knife. The blood,...Red hates that gun."

"Ditto." House shivered. Concrete flooring and dry-wall do not hold heat well. Though there were no windows to tell day from night, the temperature dropping probably indicated that the sun was setting.

Both men tensed when the door locks were rattled again and, without a glance to either Dexter or House, Red shuffled inside with a second bucket and a roll of toilet paper. He set them down, closed and locked the door. But before they had a chance to breath easier, he returned with a plate of food and a plastic Kool-aid container of water.

The door was closed and bolted and they were alone again.

Dexter immediately struggled to his knees and using tiny kitchen-maid steps, made his way to the water jug. Thankful that his hands were locked in front of him, it made it possible at least to hold the awkward thing steady enough to drink from it.

He brought it to House who did the same.

House looked bad and not just because of Red's violent sexual assault. He was pale and in obvious pain. Dexter, out of politeness (Harry hadn't been able to teach him how to feel but he had taught him how to pretend to feel. Politeness might have been lesson forty-six. So many...he couldn't quite remember), had not drawn attention to Houses nakedness or stared at his scar.

But now, out of concern, he did. House was shivering and feverish. Dexter was no physician but he knew enough to understand that was not a sign of health. He looked at the scar. It was years old, marring an otherwise fit looking man. A man who, from his over-all shape, said he used to be athletic before the leg injury curtailed anything beyond a hurried limp.

Dexter knew a few things. Being martial arts trained he had learned massage therapy, pressure points and a few other east Asian methods for pain and stress relief. Other than on himself, he'd never used the techniques before. "I can help with the pain." Dexter said.

House lay on his side sweating, in agony and trying to hide it. Skeptically. "Yeah?"

"Yeah." Dexter said. "Really. I know some Chinese methods. Pressure massage, nerve stimulation...it could help."

When House didn't say yes or no, Dexter scooted closer. "There's no one else here, Doctor House. It might do nothing or make you feel better, so you have nothing to lose."

House lay his head back on the floor, and in between heavy breaths full of pain, nodded weakly.

"Lie on your left side."

House complied, coaxing the cramping right thigh muscles to a full stretch. "Ahg." He hissed through clenched teeth.

Dexter, with difficulty because of the damn wrist irons, found the spot he wanted, a point just below and slightly behind Houses hip-bone. He explained, "This is the lateral meridian for lower extremity injury." Dexter explained wondering if it meant anything to a North American educated physician.

House wasn't buying it. "You mean my right ass-cheek?"

Dexter smiled in spite of Houses mocking tone. "The _meridian_ on your right ass cheek. I'm going to massage, using my fingers. You'll feel pressure and some pain to begin with but it'll subside-"

"-So I'll have leg _and_ ass pain. Terrific fix, _Detective_."

"Just wait." Dexter pressed his finger tips deeply into Houses gluteus muscle, searching for the right spot. Suddenly House gasped.

_There_ it was. Dexter spent several minutes massaging deeply with his stiffened finger-tips. House hissed and cursed under his breath a few more times, then seemed to settle down. Dexter worked the area for several more minutes. Finally, ten minutes had gone by before he thought it was enough.

Houses old injury was a bad one. Extra treatment would help. "How's that?" Dexter asked, his fingers still working but themselves beginning to ache. "- House?"

Dexter slowed his ministrations, stopped and glanced at Houses face. The doctor was asleep.

Dexter was glad for that. It gave House time to rest and recover...in preparation for Red's next little treat. And it gave him time to think. But there were no blankets to cover House up. No comforts what-so-ever for either if them. _At least I have pants._

According to House Red couldn't keep it up. Could barely _get_ it up. And Red hated that he couldn't. Most men would. But Red also hated those who could. House in particular. Red had to be someone from Houses past. It was House he had targeted. House he had imprisoned.

House he had _not_ killed. That part didn't fit at all.

That Red was confused was a good thing. Conflicted murderers make mistakes. No killer is as flawless in his deeds as he likes to suppose.

Why had he weighted the old surgeon down? Why wrap him up in plastic? The others had been caught, perhaps kept alive for a day or so, then raped, murdered and dumped.

Not all had been raped, or so the local examiner had thought. With the exception of the surgeon, plenty of foreign DNA had been found on the bodies. DNA in almost every orifice (Dexter hadn't mentioned that detail to House).

DNA was a slam dunk. You tested it, labeled it and entered it into a data-base. Now if you only had someone to match it to. Can't walk to the court house with one shoe.

If Red had no criminal record, the authorities had no record of him.

Red was a shadow.

XXX

The New Jersey officer approached just to the left and from behind the vehicle. Before leaving his patrol car, he'd angled his flood light onto the suspicious, possibly abandoned, car and radio-ed his location into his precincts dispatcher. Patrolling without a partner wasn't unusual, but that didn't mean you neglected protocol.

Officer Hovito shone his flashlight into the dark interior of the silver Sebrings rear seat. Nothing there but a rumpled spring jacket. He walked around to the drivers side door and tried it. It was unlocked and he swung it wide, moving the flashlights beam over everything. Didn't look like a break-in or a thrill ride had occurred. The door's locks seemed functional and the steering column appeared intact. The car undoubtedly belonged to a professional person. The interior was clean. No food wrappings on the floor. No butts in the ashtray.

The only odd thing of note was a stick leaning against the transmission gears. Hovito saw a rubber end on the stick and he followed the smooth line of the stick down to the floor where it curved into a gentle hook.

A man's cane.

XXX

Wilsons office door opened without a knock. Cuddy stuck her head in, her expression tense and a little frightened. "They found your car."

Wilson abandoned his patient's current lab results and followed Cuddy. She had not mentioned occupants.

LaGuerta and her officers were already corralled in Cuddys office, which was feeling a bit cramped. Wilson didn't have to ask any questions. As soon as LaGuerta saw him enter she explained. "Your car was located abandoned at a strip mall in Lawrenceville." Then she addressed her detectives. "The Unsub probably had one of his cars stashed there and that's where he dumped Doctor Wilsons. He knew he had to ditch Wilsons car pretty quickly and he did. Initially he probably followed you to the Super-Save in a cab."

Kidding himself, "No one saw anything? I mean in Lawrenceville?" Wilson asked.

"Their people are interviewing store owners and if they find anything they'll let our people know. But so far..." LaGuerta let the words hang.

"What can we do?" Cuddy asked. She hated that she could do nothing but run the hospital. Though it required her full attention she was willing to spread herself to a thread if it would make a difference.

LaGuerta had nothing. "Unless you can think up a reason why this guy targeted Doctor House.."

Wilson, not without some "I told you so" in his tone, "So now you think Detective Morgan was right?"

LaGuerta raised her head a little but did not bite back, allowing the worried doctor his righteous bitterness. "Evidently he was."

Wilson had spent the previous two nights sleeping in Houses bed. Snuggled up with his lovers pillows and faint odor. How had House slept those nights?

"We're doing everything we can, Doctor Wilson. We'll find our people." She shifted her backside on the edge of Cuddy's desk, which had become her habitual perch while at the hospital. "Detective Morgan is intelligent and resourceful. He...understands the criminal mind."

"That's a nice way of putting it." Doakes shot.

Cuddy looked sharply at him. The detective seemed to have it in for Detective Morgan. LaGuerta came to the defense of her missing officer. "It's accurate." She snapped. Doakes backed down. LaGuerta looked over at Wilson. "If anyone can keep Doctor House safe. Safe until we find them, it's Dexter Morgan. He's a kind of genius about these things."

Wilson hoped the man was also a magician.

XXX

Red made his next appearance and dragged House from the room.

Dexter was left in the dark and could only listen to Red's work shop human project. From the white room, in between screaming silences, came angry cursing and the sharp sound of fist on bone. Dexter flinched once or twice at what he imagined was Red's knuckles making hard contact with Houses skull, jaw or eye-socket.

Then there would be silence again.

Still, he was certain Red was not ready to kill House. This would be the appropriate room for the sort of wet work Red appreciated. It was bare of utensils that would need washing afterward. The walls could be hosed down.

It had a drain in the floor.

Red was disorganized. Dexter had been brain-working all of the things he knew about him so far and they made an incomplete and warped picture. And for a guy who already was a homicidal maniac, that was saying something.

If House didn't know Red, it was clear Red knew House. Red wanted to kill House yet Red had _not_ killed House. Dexter was frustrated with himself that he'd come no closer to answering that piece of the puzzle.

Dexter thought suddenly, maybe he was looking at the question the wrong way around. Perhaps a better question would be:

Why _not_ kill House?

The noises of beating up a man and that man's muffled yelling had ceased for several minutes. Usually that was bad sign when it came to murder. The sound of feet slowly thumping down the hallway in a rhythm-less pattern, and the sound of something heavy being dragged on the rough floor, halted any further differential on the killer.

Red drew back the bolts and threw the door open. He dragged House to the middle of the room, kicked his legs out of the way of the door so he could close it and bolted it shut. Chains and padlocks clinked then all was quiet.

Everything was silent but for the ragged breathing of the doctor. Dexter scooted on his butt closer so he could assess the man's injuries.

_Oh boy. _

Houses face was bloody from his eyes to his mouth. Red had done a number on him. Dexter very, very gently, checked Houses body for other injuries. Swelling could be seen on his scarred thigh. That meant Red hadn't acted like a sporting gentleman and had wacked it a few times with something very hard. _Probably not his dick_.

Without touching him too much, Dexter checked Houses backside for blood or signs of violation. It appeared okay. At least the guy hadn't raped him _there _yet. The guy had, though, bitten his chest a few times. Not love bites. Dexter didn't think there was any love in Red even by accident. These bites were vicious, deep and were still bleeding. So House risked infection along with the other gifts Red had so far bestowed.

And then there was the doctors face. Dexter tore a small strip of cloth from his own shirt - a masterly feet considering the restricting cuffs - and used some of their drinking water to wipe the blood away from Houses face and chest wounds. There was nothing he could do for his leg. Tomorrow House would be a human shaped bruise. No wonder he was unconscious.

The only positive note was Red had not raped House _there. _

That was...odd.

Perfect way to humiliate a man, hetero' or homosexual (any human being really), was to take the most private place and ravage it like it didn't only not belong to it's owner, but it was worth nothing to the abuser either. Rape was rather like the theft of someone's monogrammed hankerchief. Steal it, blow the contents of one's nose into it, crumple it up, toss it away. It was indifference, arrogance and selfishness taken to the extreme.

Kill a man and at least he doesn't know he's dead. Rape a man and often he's left feeling dead for the rest of his life. Rape violated Acts of War, such was considered its heinousness within any civilized society.

Rape was a psychological butchering.

Dexter watched House sleep off some of the pain in unconsciousness and asked himself again the new question:

Why _not_ kill House?

And an even newer one that had just occurred to him:

Why _not_ rape House _there_?

XXX

_**Part VII soon!**_ (This story will have at least 15 chapters)


	7. Chapter 7

**Dexter in the House. **

**Part VII**

By GeeLady

Summary: Dexter/House crossover. During his summer vacation, Dexter hunts a New Jersey killer. When he discovers who the next target is, saving him will be harder than he thinks.

Pairing: House/Dexter

It has been brought to my attention that Dexter is not actually a policeman/detective/officer. (I could swear I heard him called that). So in all following chapters those titles when referring to Dexter shall be dropped and eventually edited from the story). Thanks to my sharp eyed (and sharp memory-ed) readers!

Rated: M, NC-17, Mature, Adult! Language. Gore. Murder. Dexter/House Slash**. ****Harsh stuff****. **_**Dark themes, disturbing scenes. **_**If you ****do not**** want to read about torture or rape **--_**stop! .**_

Disclaimer: I like Dexter, he's sexy, but I would never try to abduct him 'cause I hear he has a dark side. And House, well, he just melts my buttons!

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_**One of the fundamental requirements about being a serial killer is: don't leave anyone alive to identify you. No matter what Red does to House before he kills him, Red will certainly need to kill me too. **_

_**The second fundamental requirement is: most serial killers want the world to know all about them. **_

_**The third is: you can only have the second if someone figures out the first.**_

_**The first is a given, the second is dependant on so many things. Like a really sharp police force. Or even another serial killer on the spot too witness the work.**_

_**Red is one lucky guy. For now.**_

_**As I said, number two is dependant on many things. Like:**_

_**As a serial killer, am I interesting enough? Have I left sufficient evidence somewhere that can be tied together so law enforcement reaches the vital conclusion that I am out there and that I am a very bad man? Will they recognize my very valid reasons for cutting people open? Have I killed not only those that I believe need to be killed, but will they amount to enough bodies so as to encourage significant coverage in the local news? Is there a book in this? Will I be famous? Remembered? With whom will they compare me?**_

_**I have never asked these questions of myself because Harry never let me get that far. Harry's narrow but holier highway detoured me at the right time. I'm a conscientious serial killer. (I have my screwed up ethics to consider).**_

_**One thing a serial killer who has managed to work through numbers one and two needs (if he doesn't end up recording it all himself) is a "voice". A narrator who is familiar with him and his accomplishments. Like the way a man would know the rodents in his basement by the way they chew on the insulation and leave their droppings in the corners. **_

_**  
Red probably thinks he's a pretty big rat. But I know no one out there has seen the basement. **_

_**Just me.**_

_**-**_

_**-**_

_**-**_

When House awoke, Dexter was there by his head with some water and a cool rag for his face. It was all they had and so all there was to offer.

House struggled to sit up and Dexter helped him get settled against the cool wall opposite the door. "How you're feeling?"

House didn't laugh or smile. He was way beyond pulling out a witty remark from his bag of deflecting jokes. He was way beyond most things. "I'm super. Next stupid question."

Dexter was surprised how clear his voice sounded, considering it was difficult to see the original shape of his lips behind the swollen bruises and cuts. At least Red hadn't just for fun choked him yet.

House smelled bad. Blood, sweat, semen (his own Dexter assumed). He looked worse. And Dexter could see by the doctor's body language that he was just about reaching the limit of the amount of abuse he could endure, body and soul, without cracking.

"I think Red might kill you next time." Maybe.

Words of hope were only useful when the future only _appeared_ dark, and that darkness was just that - future. When you were already _in_ the dark, you needed truth. You needed to know absolutely that you had better get your ravaged mind into over-drive and figure out a way to survive. Awful words to use, Dexter realized, to push House into a differential of his work history, but this was the razor wire fenced dead-line and the sight was trained on them both.

"You're going to die if I can't find what Red's weakness is; his reason for his actions."

House winced every time he moved. And his backside was still seeping blood. "Enjoying inflicting torture and killing isn't reason enough?"

Dexter was quite concerned. He had grown attached to House. The emotion inside that passed for love in him had not reached _fond of, _notas he was fond of his sister, Deb' (which had recently been underlined by deciding to kill his own brother rather than allow him touch a hair on her good head. That moment in time he had worked out in his head fairly swiftly. It was how he lived, after all, in his head. In other words, by reason. Emotions rarely ever came into it and if they did, he had to examine them very, _very_ closely to ensure they didn't just feel right, but _were_ right. When he allowed emotions to take over, things happened like hitting Rita's ex with frying pan then stuffing the guy in the trunk of his car. That one had worked out pretty well though. _**Still...). **_"Did he?-"

"-re-bar." House said, anticipating and answering the question. House sounded like he was stretched beyond anything resembling feeling as well.

Dexter nodded, asking no further details to preserve what remained of Houses ravaged dignity. Instead he explained, in answer to Houses inquiry, "Even in disease, cause does not follow effect. The reason may be nothing to you and me, but it could be the whole focus for his pathetic life. He can't get it up. He probably kills for that reason. How he learned this behavior; who taught it to him, even inadvertently; innocently--"

House suddenly lifted his head up and stared at Dexter through blackened eye sockets. He resembled a racoon. "--the kid..."

"What?"

House thought for a few seconds. "Doctor _Samuel_ had a case. Not my case -- Allan _Samuel_. I fellowship-ed under him for two years at Boston General - Infectious Disease. He had one case that he blew. He screwed up. We screwed up."

"What was wrong with the kid?"

"The kid was six, maybe seven years old. He had a systemic infection. We couldn't find the source but a regiment of antibiotics seemed to clear it. I had misgivings about sending the kid home without a real diagnosis, but Samuel was due to retire that week, he was anxious to get home and make travel plans with his wife. His reasoning was one I still use. If the treatment cures it, the diagnosis is right. If not, it was wrong and the disease was something else."

"The kid was okay or--?"

"--No. Kid was sent home, Samuel flew to Europe, and I stayed on to finish up the week. I hung around. I needed to know the treatment had really worked."

"It didn't."

"Sure it did. For a while. Then the kid was brought back in, this time to Emergency and screaming in pain. His groin was inflamed and stinking. We missed the site of the infection the first time because...we just missed it. The kid's testes were septic. Completely beyond saving. They had to be excised."

The little bell in Dexters head rang -- _Ping!_ The kid was Red. Red was the kid. "So he was essentially surgically castrated."

House nodded. "Reconstructive surgery made him appear normal but..."

"...but not actually be normal."

It only took Dexter a moment of silent thought to slip the jumbled pieces into their proper places. "What happened to Samuel?"

House shrugged. "Died years ago."

"So the man who caused Red to lose his manhood is beyond his reach."

"You sure this guy is that kid?"

"No. But the symptoms fit." Dexter said, once more echoing Houses own words back to him like a specters voice in his ear. House, despite his injuries and possible internal bleeding, was listening intently now.

"Samuel was dead," Dexter reasoned, "but you were not beyond his reach. Red did a little research and found you..." The last few words trailed off as another thing occurred to Dexter. "The vascular surgeon, the last victim found, was retired. He was an older man - was there anything wrong physically with Samuel? Breathing problem, heart, liver?"

"He had a disfigurement. When he was in his late thirties, his cut up his chest by riding a motorbike through a barbed wire fence. The muscles were torn, some withered. He was in some pain and didn't want do attending anymore, so he started to teach."

The last piece had finally moved and the end game was in sight. "The vascular surgeon was practice."

"Practice?"

"They all were, his victims. But Red was too inexperienced in the art of murder, so he picked others who he figured would do as appetizers. People who had physical or health handicaps like he does, but functional. They can still be either men or women. I'm not sure if Red thinks of himself as either one. Either way his victims were people he could refine his skills -- and his boldness -- on. People he could access more easily than Samuel. He invented his signature quite quickly, but still he did it as he went along."

Dexter struggled to his feet and began a slow shuffle around the room. He wanted his strength up, his reflexes sharp. As he walked he spoke, lecturing in a low, even voice, like he was recounting the crimes as though he knew them on a deeply personal level. "To begin with, Red choose victims from his own demographic, just like most serial killers do. Most pick victims from the unfortunate side of life, drifters, hookers...Red's first was easy. Blind data entry worker. Wouldn't have seen it coming and couldn't identify Red. Red took his arms because why should a blind guy be able to function in an society where Red figured he didn't fit anywhere?

"Second victim was the short armed radiologist. Red cut him from ear to ear. By this time Red probably had his game play baking in his head. He'd already chosen his third victim. Deaf male nurse whom Red all but gutted. That brought us to his fourth -- the retired surgeon. Easier to get to a retired surgeon than a working one. Different social class. Red probably felt out of place among the doctors in the hospitals where he worked. Different social status, education...and who knows? -- maybe the surgeon reminded him of your old boss.

"Then Red was ready to go after Samuel and finds out the guy is dead. Must have pissed him off." Dexter stopped and looked down at House from his nearly six feet. "Which brings us to you."

House felt like autopsy subject and not just physically. Dexter was seeing into him. House got the feeling that Dexter had a lot of reasons, some of them undisclosed, for being so frighteningly good at his job. "You were the next best thing to Samuel." Dexter knew House understood clearer now the danger he, they both, were in.

House looked up, "So the psycho's going to kill me? Thanks for clearing that up."

There was no doubt Red was going to kill them both when he felt it was time. When he had explored every corner of House, fleshly or otherwise, or when his perverted anticipation had swollen to a degree when he would need to come, not in the slow, meticulous letting of Houses of blood, but the great gushing quantities of it. When his need for the knifes slow fucking of Houses body was trumped by his need to feel safe again. When he could then get rid of the bodies and ride the roller coaster beta-endorphins for a while.

Dexter sighed. Yes, Red was going to want to kill them both very soon.

But Dexter knew now what he had to do. He had known some of it for a while now, every since Red had been careless enough to let Dexter see, however briefly, into his work shop where his tools lay scattered on the low make-shift shelf. Dexter understood Red now. Though a fairly skilled worker Red was non-the-less incompetent to a degree. Enough of a degree that Dexter knew he could work with it.

Dexter had seen through the door and now he could utilize the only weapon he had at his disposal: his intimate knowledge as one of the Red's own species. Red, a murderer not a mind-reader, did not know that it had been stupid of him to let Dexter see into the work shop.

How could Red know the man he should have been beating into a unrecognizable heap was not House, but Dexter?

"No..." Dexter answered House, his eyes wide and filled to the brim with plans. House was somewhat reassured and also appalled that Dexter looked... almost amused.

"...No, he isn't actually. That's impossible for him now." Dexter glanced through the locked, bolted door in the direction of the work shop as though he were gazing off to his home far, far away. "I _know_ him. I know everything."

There were rules about serial killing. And then there were Dexter's rules. Dexter had learned much from Harry and even more from the psychopathic creatures he had spent years hunting and killing.

Dexter smiled and to House it was an alien expression for so horrible a place.

Dexter did not enlighten House as to his rules._ School's in Red. _

_Lesson one: Don't fuck around with a better Fuck._

XXX

Maria LaGuerta, with Cuddy's approval, addressed the group of officers and hospital staff gathered in Plainsborough's Board of Directors conference room. It seemed the best location to pool resources and people. "This showed up at my office this morning and was air courier-ed here." She indicated a manila envelope with some eight by eleven typed sheets and a computer disk.

"The papers and the disk are everything Dexter was working on before he disappeared." LaGuerta silently praised Dexter for his foresight. "He had sense enough to arrange for this to be forwarded to me in the event the did not report into the holder after two days."

She handed them each several sheets of papers and a copy of the disk's contents. "Study everything on here like it was your grandmother's secret recipe. Memorize everything Dex' learned about our Unsub." She returned to her place by a white board Cuddy had provided. It was the one of two from House's office. "In the meantime Detective Doakes and Batista will be checking out the Hyatt hotel. The hotel's business card was the only item found in Dexters jacket left behind in Doctor Wilson's abandoned car."

She addressed them all. "Does anyone have anything else?"

No one spoke.

LaGuerta couldn't help but be disappointed, not so much in her officers who were sharp, but in the lack of progress. "Then let's snap to it and collar this son-of-a-bitch."

XXX

Angela Batista, his large physical presence dwarfing the hotel staff member he was speaking to, thanked her and let her go. He joined Doakes in the suite Dexter had been renting. "Anything?"

Doakes dark, pinched features glanced around. He would do his job trying to find Dexter Morgan. But that didn't mean he had to enjoy it. "No. The place was cleaned up after Morgan didn't come back to pay up his bill."

Angel was sure they would have found something. He had hoped. All room service and the hotel manager could say was House was with Dexter Morgan at the hotel for two days prior to their disappearance.

"See?" Doakes affirmed to Angel's irritation. "Bum buddies."

"Dexter's not gay, man. He's got a senorita and everything -- Una chica."

Speaking as though he wholly disagreed, "Right." Doakes said.

"I don't know why you have it in for Dexter. He's a good investigator and a good guy."

"He creeps me out."

"Yet you never seem able to explain that one, man. "Creeps me out". What the hell does that mean anyway?"

"It means what it means."

"Uh huh. Ya' know, _you_ being "creeped out" but not knowing why creeps _me_ out."

XXX

"You "know" him?" House asked. He was tired. Very tired. His stomach hurt, his ass hurt, his face, head and leg all fucking hurt. If he could cry, he would be doing so.

"I always sort of knew who Red is. But I had to know who he _was_. His specific motivation. He wasn't going to just tell me. Trust me, the only person a serial killer will reveal himself to is one he plans on killing afterward." Dexter could take his time sorting through all the details. Red would not bother them now until the morning.

House was in for a rough night. They were both in for some more unpleasantness, but they would handle it. And if House couldn't, Dexter was sure he could bring him through it almost intact.

Pretty sure.

Dexter wasn't presently thinking about that though as he shuffled around the room. He loved knowing the killer. Not the _knowing_, but the knowing what to do with him. The knowledge Red was soon coming to his end. "Red wrapped the old guy and took pains to hide the body because he felt bad - not about the human or even the corpse, and certainly not that he had just killed an innocent person, but that he had murdered the wrong person. A substitute. Red was unsatisfied, embarrassed over his work. The surgeon was an inferior finale'."

House listened, partly fascinated with Dexters dark little world of murder and death (so opposed to his of world light, life and the living), and partly repulsed by it.

"Now Red's kept us here for a few days." Dexter went on, oblivious to the other-worldly glaze of anticipation on his handsome features.

House thoroughly and shockingly noted Dexters elated expression and came to understand that here was Dexters true face. The handsome, helpful young man he had been seeing up until now was the mask.

"He's beaten and raped you. Hasn't touched me at all, though he will try. None of this fits his M.O. He's not only conflicted, he's unsure of himself. I'm not convinced he did all of his victims here, if any. The place smells too clean."

Considering their living arrangements, House thought it just one more bizarre statement in a list of little bizarre things regarding Dexter Morgan. "You haven't done much kitchen maid-ing have you?" House said.

Dexter smiled. "I'm a blood expert. Blood, as you may have noticed in your line of work, has a distinct odor, even when washed away. Particularly when it's on a surface that repeatedly gets contaminated. There's none of that odor here."

House thought blood-hounding must be one of Dexters many talents. All he could smell was his own leaking backside.

"This place has to be his house. This is where Red lives. I wish I knew his name."

"I don't think formal introductions were part of his itinerary." House lay down on the cold concrete floor, trying to gather what remained of his strength. He was worried to find he had little to gather. He wasn't sure he could stand again if asked.

Dexter looked with concern but he could do nothing to help Houses injuries. He doubt House would want him to try and fix up his anus. House being the physician would know how to do that better than he. "This is the first time Red has brought anyone to his own house. You are _personal_ to him. That makes you more difficult and I'm just another wrench in the works which pisses him off more."

Dexter sat down beside House, letting his close proximity be a comfort if nothing else could be. There was no more room, or time, for soothing words or gentleness. The end game was too close now. Dexter really wanted House to live. It was a matter of personal pride. Plus he had met few people in his life whom he had been able to pretend to care about. House was a man apart, not entirely dissimilar to himself. In some ways, he imagined, he and House might be alike. "There will be no reasoning with Red. Reasoning with a serial killer, someone devoid of conscience, is like a tire trying to reason with a deep rut in the road. For him, the only path of reason is in the rut."

Dexter lowered his voice a little, making certain his next words would reach Houses ears alone and not anyone's listening at the door. "Getting out of this will hurt, Doctor House. You, I mean. I may have to do things, say things that you will not like or appreciate. Go along with it and you might live. We both will. Fight him, fight me and you'll die."

Dexter looked into Houses eyes. Was his message clear enough? House stared back, wanting to trust but achieving frightened. Trying for hope but finding doubt.

Dexter wasn't surprised. Not many people trusted, or liked him, when first they met. "Do what I tell you and you'll survive this. I'm sure of it."

Pretty sure.

XXX

Part VIII soon!


	8. Chapter 8

**Dexter in the House. **

**Part VIII**

By GeeLady

Summary: Dexter/House crossover. During his summer vacation, Dexter hunts a New Jersey killer. When he discovers who the next target is, saving him will be harder than he thinks.

Pairing: House/Dexter

It has been brought to my attention that Dexter is not actually a policeman/detective/officer. (I could swear I heard him called that). So in all following chapters those titles when referring to Dexter shall be dropped and eventually edited from the story). Thanks to my sharp eyed (and sharp memory-ed) readers!

Rated: M, NC-17, Mature, Adult! Language. Gore. Murder. Dexter/House Slash**. ****Harsh stuff****. **_**Dark themes, disturbing scenes. **_**If you ****do not**** want to read about torture or rape **--_**stop! .**_

Disclaimer: I like Dexter, he's sexy, but I would never try to abduct him 'cause I hear he has a dark side. And House, well, he just melts my buttons!

_**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**_

_**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**_

_**John Douglas, the man who invented criminal profiling, wrote (and I'm paraphrasing): It is estimated that between eighty to a hundred serial killers are working through-out the United States at any given time. And that for those who fall within the socio-economic demographic of victim-hood (and that count is in the millions), almost every one of those persons has, at one time or another, been looked over by a serial killer as his next possible victim. **_

_**Imagine. You were standing innocently in a crowded market, at a bus stop or walking through a park. A killer's eyes fall upon you. They stop and focus in, pausing for a moment, maybe even considering, measuring...you. Will it be you? **_

_**Then the decision is made and his eyes pass on to someone else. Other more suitable prey.**_

_**This is often the legacy that childhood abuse and neglect spawn. A child who learns not to feel can grow into an adult who does not know **__**how**__** to. **_

_**And don't even talk to me about love...**_

_**And then there are killers like Red. Not neglected (at least not by his parents), not abused (except perhaps by a fleeting moment of medical incompetency or simple, unavoidable human imperfection; human error), but never-the-less manufactured. Condemned to be forever outside the human realm of experience. Cursed by rage and jealousy. Chained by hatred...**_

_**I haven't the least doubt that Red feels justified in beating the tar out of Doctor House in lieu of Doctor Samuel who had the power to ruin Red forever -- and did -- then had the nerve to die before Red could exact his...appropriate compensation. **_

_**I have even less doubt that, if he could, Red would trade his rage, jealousy and hatred for one night as a normal man. **_

_**For each hard slap, for every time he took Houses penis in his mouth, for when he forced House to do the same to his own un-inflatable organ, or when he beat him or raped him with a pipe or starved him and left him naked, Red would give all of it up to be, if even for a single day, like Doctor House. Maimed, yes. Scarred and even in pain. But fully male. Complete in body. Human for all in all. A being of mind, soul and sex.**_

_**To be the man you know others expect to see - who is normal to them and a stranger to you, is a tough role. Forever play a fake walking around in your own skin? Red wants to be just like everyone else.**_

_**I've often wondered what that was like too.**_

**XXX **__

_**Red was ready to explode. Not from need but from fear. I can see the confusion in him. His confidence is shaky. Mine is climbing like the price of oil. Red doesn't stand a chance. I almost feel sorry for him...**_

_**-**_

_**-**_

Dexter spent the night trying to get as comfortable as possible. At least it felt like night. Because their little concrete Hilton was windowless, it was hard to tell.

He also spent considerable time trying to help House get comfortable. The doc' was in serious shape. Fever and pain and the trauma of having a brutal rapist-murderer shoving things up your rectum can leave..._discomfort._

Dexter didn't even ask permission as he wrapped his arms around House and tried to keep him warm. It wasn't up to him whether or not House lived. He would do everything he could of course, for that end, but in the end, it was House who had to decide.

And Dexter guessed House was probably having trouble with that. House had lapsed into fever induced delirium and spent the night moaning, mumbling and lashing out his arms whenever Dexter shifted his own sore shoulders or hips. Concrete was bad for the joints.

And House was still bleeding from the tail end. Internal damage was likely the cause. Red, in his frenzy of jealousy had ripped something inside him. Punctured or nicked his colon. That meant bacteria filled bowel fluid leaking into and contaminating House's insides. A recipe for infection and death.

Dexter spoke pointless words, encouraging sleep, that would bring House no ease. One, maybe two more sessions with Red and House would be done for. Two things would happen, Red would take up his knife and dispatch the doctor for his reward in blood pools. Or House would lose it, scream and thrash which would accomplish the same result only Red would do a lousy hack job and House would suffer more than he needed to.

But neither of those things were going to happen. Dexter would make sure of that. Today he would step up and earn his moniker. Well, _again_.

As if on cue, Red's footsteps walked down the hallway. Dexter did not move from his place behind House on the floor. He left his arms wrapped around the nude, bleeding man for Red to see.

Dexter wanted Red to drink it in. Wanted him to know that he, Dexter, as fucked up as he was (Red was in the dark about _that_ part), could feel another human being; be close to that human; feel affection for that human; need and want for that human that transcended enraged curiosity or seething envy.

Dexter wanted Red to feel alien, animal even, and therefore lower than him. A lesser being in terms of love and sex.

The door opened and Dexter stared up at the masked creature who stood upright on two legs holding a gun in his paw.

"Morning." Dexter said like Red was the postman.

That gave Red...pause. But he said nothing. Only gestured for Dexter to move away from House. Dexter did but not before performing a little ritual for Red to see, and an even tinier one for House to feel. With his left hand hidden from Red's view, Dexter pressed down on a particularly sensitive spot between the base of House's skull and his shoulder. Dexter kept his fingers in place for a brief few seconds until he felt House go limper and his breath even out a little. He was not unconscious but he was in less pain and less aware of his surroundings.

Spock would be pleased.

Dexter then reached with his lips and kissed House on his cheek, ran fingers through his greasy hair, _then_ obeyed Red by removing his cuffed arms above House's head and free from his body. Dexter didn't move far though, and that gave Red another pause. "Move!" He snarled.

Dexter sighed and shuffled on his butt a few feet farther away, saying "Red. Red, Red, Red, _**Red**_..."

Red was so startled by the familiar, friendly tone and the words that suggested his prisoner was disappointed in him, he froze in place. "Don't fucking call me Red or speak!"

Dexter smiled just a little. A tiny, self-indulgent, dangerous grin. "You're not _really_ going to do him in your own house, right?"

Red looked at him while poking a booted foot into House's side. "Get up!" Red was tired of dragging House's ass back and forth.

"He's a little tired this morning." Dexter said, ignoring Red's order for him to shut up. "We were,...rather _busy_ last night."

Red swallowed the hook like a hungry fish. His black eyes behind the mask's black holes asked the unspoken question. _Doing what?_

Dexter let his eyes fall on House's still body, but spoke to Red, pointedly, and rudely, not looking at him when he said it. "What did you think I meant? We're not _cousins_."

Red swallowed. His anger, shock and fury all swirled around the little sinkhole his heart occupied.

Dexter nodded to the cheap Walmart video camera Red had crudely hooked up and hung on the ceiling. "It doesn't actually work, does it?"

The silence said it all.

Suddenly Red whirled from the room. Sliding the locks back into place Dexter heard him stomp away down the hall.

Dexter then heard the unmistakable crash of things being thrown around. Clanging tools and breaking glass assaulted his satisfied ears.

He smiled.

XXX

Wilson avoided walking by House's office whenever possible but there were times, like now, when he had no choice. Or when his legs carried him there involuntarily just so he could, irrationally, glance into House's office on the off chance that his lover would be sitting there, playing with his ball, twirling his cane and even, on occasion, working. Not missing or in danger. And not floating belly down in a lake or washed up on a riverbank somewhere three days dead.

Foreman was sitting there in House's chair playing with House's green ball, tossing it back and forth between his hands, casually looking at the walls, the books. Wilson was suddenly hot with outrage that Foreman would take it upon himself to sit there ever, like he was glancing at his own bright future.

Wilson entered, ready with a few well chosen words to inflict upon the man who was not a member of the very exclusive House fan club. But Foreman looked up at him and quickly realized that playing with House's ball in his absence might be misconstrued as callused disrespect for the man's personal things. He dropped it immediately. With a look of apology and even kindness, Foreman asked, "Any news?"

His anger vanished. Wilson shook his head. "Nothing." He rubbed one hand with the other in an unconscious wringing. "Police, LaGuerta's detectives, are interviewing pharmaceutical companies and their likely employees. Clients too. That makes for about two thousand people to look over locally."

Foreman nodded.

Wilson couldn't help himself, "Planning on getting it re-padded?"

Foreman understood Wilson's back-handed reference to his well known ambitions. Foreman wanted his own department and soon. If not neurology, Diagnostics would do just fine.

They all knew Wilson was frantic, just as they all - mostly all - knew he and House had recently become lovers, but all the same he wasn't going to sit back and let Wilson insult him without foundation. "It's no secret House isn't my favorite person. In fact, I don't much like the guy on a personal level. But I respect like hell his abilities as a physician."

Foreman stood to face his accuser. It was a physical message that he and Wilson were equals and don't forget it. And as a way of indicating he was sincere and on the level. "Everything else aside?...if the news we eventually hear...isn't what we hoped for, Doctor Wilson, I _won't_ be dancing."

XXX

Detective Angelo Batista, partnered with Doakes for the duration, by phone and by foot, interviewed their massive list of people. Not all possible suspects, but most. The local FBI field office had faxed over an incomplete profile based on the information Dexter had sent to LaGuerta and everything else they had gathered thus far.

Using the hastily slapped together profile as a basis for investigation for their next phase, employers were tracked down at the office or at their homes. Employee rosters were asked for and produced. The investigation then began in earnest with the employers top of the list. Bosses often knew which employees were weird and which were not, depending on the size of the company, the employers themselves being scrutinized during the interview.

It was foot work to die by. Run downs of company vans and who had access and when. Which employees worked nights? Which lived alone or with their old moms? Who struck his work-mates as a loner? Who never seemed to have a girlfriend or if he did, it didn't last? (statistically they knew their Unsub was most likely male. Females hardly ever worked alone and, with rare exceptions, were never the controlling mind in the duo. Almost always they lived under the thumb of their bigger, stronger, more violent male partner in crime).

Between LaGuerta's people and the local PD, after nearly thirty-six hours of tireless effort, a list of eleven names remained on the list. Initially groups of possibles could be knocked off because they were either out of town, had rock-solid alibis, were too old or too young, were light years away in personality and lifestyle from the profile or fell under a host of other criteria that marked them for elimination from the list.

"Eleven names." Angelo scanned the list. "PD's taking the core, we've got the 'burbs."

Doakes sipped coffee and said nothing. He was a highly trained former Military Special Op's turned Miami detective. He didn't hold with Dexter Morgan but he would do his job. He would blow away a psycho in order to save a creep. "Who's first?"

"Martin McKillop." Angelo handed the list to Doakes and concentrated on his driving. He liked Dexter. Liked him enough to consider him his best friend.

So, yeah, the guy was a little weird. So was everyone. So was Doakes who carried around a perpetual frown on his face and a chip on his shoulder the size of a California old growth Cedar. _So am I. I actually believed myself when I thought I could get my wife back_. Self delusion was a uniquely human trait.

"Turn here." Doakes monotone-ed.

XXX

LaGuerta tossed a folded newspaper on Cuddy's desk. "This is how the Unsub knew someone was on to him. My guess is Dexter was trying to draw him out, get a meeting." She frowned at the curiousness of that. "The only thing is, I'm not sure why Dexter would want to confront a killer. He's not really a cop, though he does work for us."

"You called him Detective."

"Force of habit. Dex' has some of the same training but he's not shielded."

Cuddy assumed "shielded" meant Dexter Morgan did not have a badge. LaGuerta, she had noted, often referred to Dexter Morgan as "Dex'". Yet addressed her other staff, even when they were not in the room, by "Detective" or "Detective So-and-So."

LaGuerta continued. "I call all my employees detective. Or _jerk_."

Cuddy smiled and it had been a while. Her lips felt like they had cracked in a few places. "You like him."

LaGuerta was quick. "I like them all, after a fashion."

"I wasn't trying to pry." Cuddy didn't know why she was trying to stretch the conversation out, or why she felt the need to make it more personal. Maybe because she was strung out with worry and needed a distraction. Or because for a very rare change of pace, she was dealing with another woman in charge and felt the need to make a connection with her. See eye to eye. Clique professionally. Maybe LaGuerta might even become a long distance friend, Cuddy hoped. Lord knows she had few of those. Even of the nearby variety.

"No problem. It's just that you ought to know it would be unprofessional of me to date one of my employees. Like you have, for instance."

Cuddy did a mental stepping back. Whoa. She had stumbled upon LaGuerta's sensitive spot. Sensitive because the question had been asked before. Because something had been noticed in LaGuerta's behavior that was un-professional? Enough that a superior had remarked on it?

LaGuerta's knee-jerk quip was a challenge. Raised hackles appeared to be tightly woven into the Lieutenant's personality. Challenge or be challenged. Fight. _Win_. All the same.

But Cuddy wasn't exactly just out of high school. LaGuerta was in charge of a dozen people.

Cuddy was Alpha she-wolf running with a thousand. "You think I've made a play for Doctor House?"

"I don't remember specifying which employee."

_"Never_ as my employee."

"Then we understand one another." LaGuerta meant _You stay out of my business and I'll stay out of yours._

Cuddy was all for it. Aloud, she read the newspaper ad.""You have wounded my heart. Your favorite color must be red. (Is there a doctor in the house?). I want to meet you. Signed Fan."."

Cuddy thought it interesting but a bit cryptic. "Seems like this could apply to almost anyone. Lots of people might think it was meant for them."

"Dexter was counting on the Unsub's ego. His admiration for himself. He would be the most likely to see himself as the subject of the ad. Particularly because of the subtle way it praises that subject. And the signature -- "Fan". That's what our Unsub is looking for. Acknowledgement and justification. He wants to shock the world and be accepted by them too. That's why he's going to be caught."

"I'm not sure-"

"-Murderers think they're smarter than everyone. This guy wants out fear _and_ our love. But you can't have both. So because he's trying to get both, he will have to expose himself. Even to get just one." LaGuerta accepted the newspaper back from Cuddy. "And murderers, at least these type, serial killers, have to eat too. And live somewhere and that means work and that means he has an address and a routine that he can't afford to abandon."

Cuddy listened to LaGuerta's on-the-spot lesson in police work. "I've instructed the employers and managers of all the pharmaceutical companies to inform us immediately if they fire someone or someone fails to show up for work or, more importantly, if someone quits. That could be our guy. We get too close. He has to run. Either way, sooner or later, he shows himself."

Cuddy hoped sooner rather than later.

XXX

"They don't think you're real, you know." Were the first words Dexter spoke when Red next opened the door to do...whatever he had come to do. Without giving him so much as a second to feel he was in power, Dexter had, with a verbal carving knife, hacked a big chunk of superiority off Red's aura.

Dexter, making sure he was sitting next to House who was, while not sleeping, not all there either (perhaps that was for the best.), wanted Red to see the closeness between him and the bloody red Doctor who, while physically beaten and lying on the concrete in Red's house, was never-the-less not owned by him in any significant way.

Ownership. Human contact. Affection. Love. Lust and urgent, _easy_ sex. Hard in a second, fuck for an hour. Things Red would never possess. Perhaps _that _was for the best.

These were the things Dexter wanted to show Red, though for now it was enough that Red assumed such things happened between them. Dexter would actually leave House untouched for now.

Measured by the means Red had touched him, sufficient for each day is its own horror.

"They think you're a phantom. _Non-existent_."

Red had not moved from the door. He was staring at Dexter openly stone cold but, Dexter guessed rightly, privately fascinated.

"They don't believe there is a serial killer here. New Jersey police don't have the eyes to see you the way I do."

Did Red believe him? "If you don't believe me, watch the news reports. Any mention of a serial killer?"

Then Dexter, saving the best for last, "Any even casual off-the-cuff mention of a pathetic, sloppy murderer picking off easy prey, missing his prime target and then not knowing what the hell to do with the secondary one? And fucking locking them in your _basement??_ Come _on_, Red! That's like a cheap and _stupid_ Fritzl knock-off. And you don't have a clue what to do with me! I'm unexpected. I'm a kink in what could only loosely be called," Dexter made little quotes in the air with his fingers (not easy with the cuffs but he made even that come across as the performance of a master) "your plan"? I'm your un-eatable, un-fuckable, younger, better looking, prey. And -- my god! -- you're fucking _in the dark." _

Dexter's words reached their target like flaming arrows to a bull's-eye and he watched Red turn from grown-up threatening monster to un-esteemed, il-confidant boy.

The un-fuckable stuff was in reference to Red's inability, not Dexter's ill-attraction. And Red knew it.

Dexter moved in for a kill shot. "Did you know a disproportinate number of serial killers are homosexual? You're probably a fag, am I right?" Dexter smiled as though enjoying a private joke between him and Red but at Red's sole expense. "Only you can't _do_ anything about it. I mean, you can lift your ass to someone but you get no pleasure from it. And don't let me start on what the girls must have thought of you."

Dexter knew it was time, well passed actually, for Red to show he didn't appreciate Dexter's observations. Red took one, two steps toward Dexter who did not drop his eyes or even blink.

Red stopped, ready to shoot, kick or even yell. Except he didn't do any of those things. The gun in his hand shook.

Suddenly Red turned and stormed out, slamming and locking the door with furious bangs and grunts.

More smashing and crashing followed. Red's poor work shop bench. _Must be in splinters by now_.

Dexter had made a few too.

Beside him House stirred. He had heard the exchange with increasing terror, certain Dexter would goad the man to uncontrollable fury. House had been sure Red was about to shoot them both. "What are you trying to do? Get us killed faster? I thought your..." He took a deep breath. So tired. "...solution was suppose to lead us _away_ from death?"

"I am." Dexter looked down at House lying inches from him. He really did wish he could help him now, or spare him from what was coming. But survival among the none human meant shedding the pleasant side of humanity. Occasionally Dexter had read refreshers about that nice side to hone his skills at pretend.

"How? What's your brilliant plan? To send him into a killing rage and then talk him out of it?"

"No." Dexter answered, his eyes on the door now. "To talk him_ into _it."

With effort House raised a painfully swollen face to his jail-mate. If Dexter could see passed the bruises and seeping blood, he knew he'd find fear there.

"Are you nuts?"

"Yes actually." Dexter answered, as honest as sunshine.

On his face, the mask of the nice young man had fallen. Green eyes that hardly ever blinked stared down and somehow over and around House. He shivered.

Dexter added, "But I'm going to help Red become a better serial killer."

He reached out and touched the blood-stiffened hair on House's head. A make believe gesture of kindness to encourage belief. It was worth a try. No one in their right mind would really trust that his next words were not crazy. "I'm going to teach him how to kill you."

XXX

Part IX soon!


	9. Chapter 9

**Dexter in the House. **

**Part IX**

By GeeLady

Summary: Dexter/House crossover. During his summer vacation, Dexter hunts a New Jersey killer. When he discovers who the next target is, saving him will be harder than he thinks.

Pairing: House/Dexter

It has been brought to my attention that Dexter is not actually a policeman/detective/officer. (I could swear I heard him called that). So in all following chapters those titles when referring to Dexter shall be dropped and eventually edited from the story). Thanks to my sharp eyed (and sharp memory-ed) readers!

Rated: M, NC-17, Mature, Adult! Language. Gore. Murder. Dexter/House Slash**. ****Harsh stuff****. **_**Dark themes, disturbing scenes. **_**If you ****do not**** want to read about torture or rape **--_**stop! .**_

Disclaimer: I like Dexter, he's sexy, but I would never try to abduct him 'cause I hear he has a dark side. And House, well, he just melts my buttons!

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_**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**_

_"The circumstances surrounding the disappearance of Miami Forensic Specialist Dexter Morgan and Diagnostic Specialist Doctor Gregory House of Princeton Plainsborough Hospital here in New Jersey,..." _

Lieutenant Maria LaGuerta's calm and even voice spoke into the camera and therefore into the living rooms of New Jersey, encouraging its citizens to be calm - and assuring them there was not a deranged killer working the State and they could rest comfy in their beds at night. The room was bustling with reporters, cameras and microphones.

_"...do not at this time - I repeat - do not at this time appear to be overtly suspicious. As to the rumors of a serial killer plying his trade here in Princeton, those rumors are unsubstantiated. We, in cooperation with local law enforcement, are treating this as a missing persons case. And we have every confidence that the outcome of this case will be a positive one. There will be no questions answered at this time, thank you."_

XXX

"Red'll probably come for you today." Dexter said when he saw House's eyes flutter open after a terrible night of pain and little sleep. A night House had spent in fever and shivers, pain and the shaking of full detox. Not to mention the psychological memoirs and stirring physical reminders of a brutal rape. Brutal was subjective. There was unkind, then there was Red. like there was snow flakes and avalanches. It all depended on your perception.

Dexter recalled by ear the thirty minute session twenty-four hours previous where Red undoubtedly failed to get it up while shoving a length of rebar up House's rectum. Dexter could almost guess the instrument of molestation by the type of pain House was feeling, and the type of pain by the sort of scream or groan of agony House made.

Ironically Red could have easily made House's life much worse. If Dexter was in the driver's seat for example... _House would already be in the Gulf Stream well on his way to the North Atlantic. _

But time waits for no Freak and Dexter, too, was tired of cold nights on a concrete floor. And he was sick of being dirty and hungry. And simply fed to the teeth with waiting. Red was a serial killer stuck in second gear. Slow to the kill. _Must be that ball-less dick of his._ Red stumbles at the gate then runs sideways. Jumps off track.

_Enough metaphors Dexter. You're beginning to sound like Doctor Phil. Or some other doctor. Come one Red, let's get this up close and personal horror show on the road._

Like his thoughts had been heard, Dexter's ears picked up the sound of the outer door and heavy footsteps descending wooden stairs. It had been over a day since Creepy Red had opened that door and inflicted some new cruelty on Doctor House. Or just the cruelty of exposing them to his creepy self. Red's need to feel better about his sub-human creepiness would be getting up there. He was already, Dexter calculated, at least a week passed his four month slaughter schedule.

_By now the pain of being Red must be almost intolerable._

Red's need for relief upon a kill would be tremendous, the reward exquisite.

But Dexter had his own schedule to keep and it was time to prime his primary means to beat Red to the finish.

_May the best freak win._

With the few minutes Dexter had left, and he needed every one if he hoped to save the life of his prison mate, Dexter gathered his words, items, intents and the vision of his trophy in mind and hand.

House, he knew, was just a few screams shy of nuts. And a few purple bruises short of Barney. And maybe only a day or so short of dead. Dexter could not have prevented the first two but he was sure as hell not going to let Red add insult to injury and kill Doctor House. Dexter had grown fond of House. Greg House now had his own slot in Dexter's "People I Hope to _**Really**_ Care About Someday." file.

_Red not included._

Dexter had another filed for Red's ilk: three dimensional secret wood box with brass fittings and no label. Dexter had picked it out himself and thought it very stylish. But the box wasn't here.

_I must remember to take a drop or two of Red home with me._

With moments to spare, Dexter roused House fully awake with a shake and helped him sit up. "The prick's here, Greg."

House, he saw, was suddenly shaking. From cold, fever, infection, hunger, terror,...what was to come? Probably the whole salad.

Dexter took House's face in his shackled hands, turned his ear to his own mouth and spoke words greased with speed and the authority of the Head Psycho In Charge.

"This time I want you to kick and scream and thrash and do every fucking thing you can to inconvenience him. Fight him all the way and he'll leave that door open."

House opened exhausted eyes sick to death with pain and red with fear. Dangerous eyes that wanted to give up. "Are you,...going to try...escape?" House croaked softly.

_The subject of his sexual jealousy and life-long hatred is almost done. Red's cutting it close._ Dexter thought. Then his own green eyes, brimming with anticipation, looked back into House's and he whispered harshly into his ear, "I'm gonna' make friends with the son-of-a-bitch."

_That's no lie. _

"And then I'm going to end this."

_That's no lie either. "End" being subjective too._

Dexter's flavor of end. Damn near credits time and House didn't need to know how the show was going to wrap, even if he was the star. "I've got this under control, Doctor House."

House, seated against the wall, hands and feet forever in chains, nearing his end, croaked, "Sure. B-been...loads so far."

_I didn't blame House for doubting me. I haven't yet exactly distinguished myself here. But then even I've never been __**here**__ before. House has good reason to doubt my word. Number one, I told him that I might have to hurt him (that's __**probably, **__not might, but he's in bad enough shape as it is), in order to save him and number two, he's locked in a basement with a psychotic rapist killer - who __**does**__ want to kill him and has made that perfectly clear. Assurances from a guy in a golf shirt who all but said he was insane too would be hard to swallow at this point. Doctor House is right to think who the hell do I think I am?_

_But then, Doctor House hasn't seen my resume'._

Dexter could hear Red's indelicate footsteps nearing the door. Dexter knew he had only a moment now to convince Doctor House that he, with perhaps one or two awful things still to endure, would really survive serial killer Red's basement carnival of fun.

Dexter put his mouth an inch from House's right ear and, in a manner where his words came hard and fast like bullets with all similar power to destroy whom ever they railed against, whispered, "He's-coming-but-he's-inert-next-to-me. Red-is-a-fucking-amateur-with-no-goddamn-idea-he's-about-to-go-down. Fail-miserably! I-own-this fucking-guy-understand? Red's-mine-now-the stupid-_moron_-who-uses-his-own-fucking-_basement!-_He-can't-kill-you-he-may-hurt-you-and-I-may-hurt-you-but-you-will-not-die-Doctor-House. You. Will. _Not._ Die. Today."

-

-

-

-

_When Red opened the door, House swore a streak of words for his ears only that rivaled Doakes when he doesn't get his morning Danish. House was angry at me and terrified of Red. Not of dying, House didn't seem a bit afraid of that part, just all the stuff that was probably going to happen to him prior to dying. The part where Red made his point clear that he didn't much like whole men since he could never be one. _

_Red's choice. He didn't have to start killing innocent people. He could just as easily have taken up Squash. Good exercise. No mess. _

_Hmmm. Today for the first time Red isn't wearing the balaclava. That means it's show time. His time. My show._

Dexter took a deep breath and steadied already pretty damn steady nerves for the work at hand. Addressing Red, "I'm assuming you don't want to be caught, right? At least not right away. All this work is suppose to teach someone, somewhere a lesson not to fuck with you again."

_Charging right in usually worked best in these situations where you are in chains and the guy who wants to kill you has a gun. IF he's going to kill you no matter what you do, you may as well say what you want. Not saying anything just makes pulling the trigger or swinging the knife easier for him. But if he's unsure about killing you, lots of talking is the thing to do. It disarms him, puzzles him, makes him think. Makes him doubt himself._

"You want people to "O-o-o-o-o" over your work don't you? This may have started out as personal revenge but it's taken on a higher meaning now. They'll see it that way, too, but only if they know about it. And we both know they don't know about it. The murders, sure. Just not the connections and certainly not you. _You_ don't exist to them."

Red was struggling to get House on his feet and for a minute Dexter was worried House had forgotten his little lecture about thrashing and making it hard on psycho man. But then House, for all his pain, started to jerk and yell and it so shocked Red he half dragged/half carried House to the chair and had to fight to chain him in. He had not closed the door.

Dexter quickly got to his knees and baby-stepped his way down the hall after them, being careful to keep his distance respectable.

Red trained the gun on Dexter who stopped. "Come on, Red. You know what I am. You've known since you read my Ad. I _understand. _I see everything where those idiots see nothing. This won't be a book or a movie of the week unless they have confirmation it actually happened and you did it all. It's not the money, it's the _moral." _

Dexter settled himself down on the floor just inside Red's work-shop. It smelled of fresh bleach and cleanser. All of Red's previously dull and contaminated "tools" shone. The work bench was righted and laid out with a paper table cloth.

Dexter sniffed the air. "Did you wipe the walls down too? His blood will still be on the walls. Tiny, _hundreds_ of tiny droplets of it. A spray, a fine mist. Don't be embarrassed that you missed them, any layman would miss them." He sniffed again. "I can _smell_ the DNA in the air. Don't you think this...undecorated room spoils the build-up to your crown ruby? Pretty conventional. And from everything I've seen about you so far, you want to do this not just right but with finesse. Style. Flair. A genius' touch?"

Red stared at Dexter, something stirring behind his pale grey eyes, sandy hair of no discernable style and nose freckles.

_The guy resembles my pizza delivery guy, only more career oriented._

"We're talking book. Maybe movie-of-the-week." Though in cuffs, Dexter linked his hands behind his head and settled back like a theater patron about to enjoy the show. "One look in my eyes and you know I don't give a shit about the guy. Just doing my job. But this..." Dexter shook his head and glanced around the room as though it's inferior preparation was a terrible disappointment considering the entry fee.

To emphasize his point, "Do you know what Edward Kemper said? He killed people and made furniture from their skins but just before he got caught he said his urge to indulge his craving became very strong and that the longer he let it go the stronger it got, until he started taking risks to kill people. Risks that previously he wouldn't have taken because they might have lead to his arrest."

Red hesitated. Looked over at House, who was looking back and forth between Dexter and Red with a stew of fear, despair and, Dexter hoped, one tenuous thread of maybe. But mostly the first two.

Ignoring House, Dexter looked back at Red. "And John Norman Collins expressed psychopathic ideologies. _Stupid_ ideologies but what can ya' do? You know, he once had told a date that if a man needed to kill, he ought to. If it was right for him, then he should. The perfect crime, John said, was when there was no guilt. Without guilt, a person could not get caught." Dexter let his feet sway back and forth a bit. He was playing. "Trust me, Red, DNA'll get you caught. Being stupid will too."

Dexter, bored of the conversation, shrugged. "I've read everything there is to read about serial killers. All this is going to do is make a hell of a mess of your basement and, assuming you allow yourself to be caught when you're ready to, lower their estimation of your I.Q. by about a hundred."

Red, his right hand on the gun, his other at his side, did not made a step toward his knives. He had not even lobbed a rude gesture toward House.

So much silence fell in the room Dexter wondered if the man had turned to salt.

_That would make things much easier._

Then, "_What_ have you read?" Freak-boy asked.

"Techniques. Styles. Signatures. Method of Operations, all that FBI shit. There are lots of good ways to do House. After we have some fun, cut him up and get rid of the body, the clean up will be like a snap. No mess. No fuss. Spic n' span. The best part is you won't be caught until you want to be."

"Okay," Red's voice was a mocking sneer. He had to keep up appearances of being the superior intellect and the guy in the captain's chair. "Let's hear it, asshole."

Dexter frowned as though tabulating from his vast memory of serial killers and their vast, varied accouterments of trade. "First, you're gonna need about three rolls of grey, water-proof tape and," With his eye he roughly gauged the size of the work shop, "maybe two thousand square feet of plastic..."

"-Wait a second!"

_Shit!_

"What did you mean - "fun"?"

_Double shit! I was hoping to spare House this, myself too, and devise another way of coaxing Red close enough to experience the my signature Dark Avenger moves. But now... _

_"_Well, He's got really nice, round firm ones. And,.." Dexter let out a huge breath as though he had been holding back suggesting something a little off-color. Something he wanted but was reluctant to ask considering Red was holding a _gun_ on him and everything. "I'd like a little more..."satisfaction" from him before we, you know..." Dexter had said the "we" to introduce the idea of him and Red as a team of sorts.

_Fucked up, psycho-on-the-spot team, but it's a notch above being a corpse_.

Dexter glared at Red's slowness. "I mean if I'm going to die anyway??..."

Dexter sighed, exasperated with Red's dull thinking. "Great last chapter to the book, Red. I'll be dead but I'll be infamous. How many people can say that?" Dexter narrowed his eyes and stared into the future where he was a star. Posthumous bad guy. The murderer everyone one loves to hate. "Maybe they'll get Brad Pitt to play me."

"Shut up asshole!"

Dexter shut up and looked up at Red without rancor or reaction. Instead he switched to staring at House, looking him up and down, his eyes coming to rest on House's flaccid penis and his leg scar. Red's eyes, like little grey chicks, followed Dexter's lead and raked House's restrained, nude body in his own loveless way.

Dexter himself, knowing had badly House needed it, did not slip him any expression of reassurance now. His green gaze roamed over House as though inspecting a side of beef. Or examining with clinical interest a spray of blood drops at the latest anonymous crime scene. Or a naked, chained guy he'd like to rape.

Dexter puckered his lips and threw House a quick sarcastic kiss. A universal "Just you wait baby, we're gonna have us some _fun_."

House, eyes watering and breaths coming fast and labored as a man's would who was about to die, turned his eyes to the cracked linoleum floor. His trembling returned and his doubt solidified in the rank air of Red's cool basement.

House wasn't thinking of much anymore but the pain he was feeling in the flesh and the agony in his chest of knowing he would not see Wilson anymore. And that somewhere, in a few weeks, maybe Wilson would have to make a trip down to the Plainsborough's Morgue and identify his decomposing remains.

House, in his fevered brain and shrinking soul, imagined a heartbroken Wilson signing off so the coroner could wrap his reeking body up in plastic and ship it to the city's larger Morgue so they could give it a mediocre, City-paid (as a last ditched honor to assay their collective guilty consciences for having failed to catch the murderer of one of their country's famous and finest medical geniuses) quickly arranged burial.

And the psycho that House had no suspicion of existing inside Dexter the helpful young man (until now), was going to try and save him, and Wilson, from that.

House laughed a little. The laugh of a hysterical, helpless, hopeless corpse.

Red made no comment over the emotional breakdown of his naked treat chained to the chair. He was thinking about Dexter's request.

"I'm going to throw you the keys to your hand cuffs. Unlock 'em and then get over there." Red gestured to House who stared at Dexter, his savior and executioner.

Dexter saw House mouth the word _No _to him.

Dexter unlocked his wrist cuffs and knee-walked his way to House, waiting in front of him. Staring. Dead of face. Dangerous eyes.

Dexter waited for Red to drop the flag on his humiliating soon to be enacted sexual assault on the doctor whose life he had once promised to save.

House was crying openly now, his head bowed at this worst of things. The worst act one human can commit on another; that his friend was about to do to him.

_"Please don't." _House gurgled-whispered from a throat raw with cold and the wormy cock of a mad-man.

Dexter almost paused. If Red had been a more perceptive freak, he would have seen the drop of the mask over the mask that was Dexter's usual put-on daily face.

But Dexter recovered before Red, or even House, noticed.

House shook his head in a silent pleading that his friend not inflict on him the greatest humiliation of his life so far, the tears flowing like twin rivers. Infected waters. The run off from a mountain raped of life.

Somehow, by a performance worthy of an Oscar, Dexter was unmoved.

While Red watched with envy, hunger and utter fascination, Dexter bent his head down and took House's penis in his mouth.

_House will live through this. I will too. But I'm beginning to wonder if he'll want to. Anyway, no amount of pre-apology would have made any difference. Not for this. Not for taking the last crumb of him too small for a mouse. The tiny bit of House that he might have saved and tucked away somewhere in a corner of his invaded psyche. _

_The part I'm now "blowing my nose" into. Underline the "blowing"._

_- _

_-_

_-_

_The only bright spot in this black-hole is that soon Red will be dead._

_I can almost smell the fuckers DNA._

XXX

Part X ASAP.


	10. Chapter 10

**Dexter in the House. **

**Part X**

By GeeLady

Summary: Dexter/House Crossover. During his summer vacation, Dexter hunts a New Jersey killer. When he discovers who the next target is, saving him will be harder than he thinks.

Pairing: House/Dexter

It has been brought to my attention that Dexter is not actually a policeman/detective/officer. (I could swear I heard him called that). So in all following chapters those titles, when referring to Dexter will be dropped and eventually edited from the story. Thanks to my sharp eyed (and sharp memory-ed) readers!

Rated: M, NC-17, Mature, Adult! Language. Gore. Murder. Dexter/House Slash**. ****Harsh stuff****. **_**Dark themes, disturbing scenes. **_**If you ****do not**** want to read about torture or rape **--_**stop! .**_

Disclaimer: I like Dexter, he's sexy, but I would never try to abduct him 'cause I hear he has a dark side. And House, well, he just melts my buttons!

**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**

**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**

Back in their room of solid makings and cold, cold reality, it was useless to try and comfort House now. A place like this held no state of well being or kindness. Myths.

"Don't fucking touch me!" House shoved Dexter's hand away and Dexter obeyed by not only withdrawing the offending appendage but by butt-scooting a few feet sideways.

_House won't let me near him. Can't say as I blame the guy. When your savior who promised to rescue you from the psychopathic rapist suddenly joins the game, all bets are off._

_I didn't enjoy what I did and not only in the sexual sense. But my goal is to keep Doctor House alive and that means being a bigger psycho' than our host, or at least appearing to be. If my performance isn't convincing, Red won't buy it. I may have to do other unpleasant things to House if I hope to get close enough to Red to do even more unpleasant things to him. I have to play the bastard to House until Red is disarmed enough for me to get close enough to disarm him. Dis-leg. Dis-head... _

_...so many choices._

_Red enjoyed the little show I put on for him (and that House put on by default). Right now House doesn't like me a dump-truck full. He's a doctor, and he recognizes a maniac when he sees one. This isn't an episode in his life he'll look back on with gratitude, even if he does live through it. He won't want to look back at all I'm betting. _

_I certainly didn't and I know all about horror. I've seen it done and done it lots. My personal hell never left me even when I couldn't remember it because my soul never forgot._

_This time and place, this is going to be House's personal hell he might never forget or if he does, only the hidden part of his soul might someday recall. _

_This place is going to be his two inches of blood._

XXX

"How many days again before the police assume they're already dead and this becomes a body search?"

Wilson had come to Cuddy's office to sit and ask the questions he needed to ask, the ones she couldn't answer. The questions even the police, for all their training and know-how, couldn't answer.

Her office was empty today but for herself, James Wilson and his two tormented eyes. Cuddy wondered if she looked as scared.

"I don't know."

Lieutenant LaGuerta and her team along with the local police had repaired to a nearby precinct to continue with the investigation that was already five days old.

"They said after two weeks, then . . . "

Wilson nodded quickly so she would not complete her thought. "_After two weeks, most victims of this type of killer are likely already dead_." That had been Angel's quiet, apologetic, kindly word to him. He, the largest and most imposing man of the lot, possessed the gentlest soul. Whether he was referring to his own friend Dexter or House who was a stranger to him, Angel spoke respectfully of them and was a man of honest words. "_We'll do everything we can to find our friends, Doc'."_

XXX

"I gave you orders to stay in Miami." LaGuerta barked at the young woman standing in Doctor Cuddy's office.

Out of respect, Lieutenant Maria LaGuerta was visiting to personally update Doctor Lisa Cuddy on the progress of the investigation. Cuddy and she may have exchanged words, and might exchange one or two more, but she still held the doctor herself in high esteem. Lisa Cuddy was a woman doing a difficult job at an even worse time and she stood it well.

But LaGuerta had arrived at Plainsborough hospital only to find Debbie Morgan in Cuddy's office and more-over, it appeared she had been there long enough for Cuddy to have brought her up to date on everything she knew about the circumstances of the case.

"This is my brother who's missing. This is Dexter we're talking about. No fucking way was I going to stay in Miami."

"Watch your mouth. So you just dumped the case you were on and left."

"No." Detective Morgan thrust a file under her boss's nose. "It was the boyfriend. We caught him. He did the woman _and_ the kid to so we'd suspect the husband. Only the guy was stupid about women because she talked to her best friend - told the friend she thought the secret boy-toy was "getting weird and carrying a knife.". Plenty of evidence once we knew what to look for. Boy-toy's being arraigned in two weeks." LaGuerta's hard-ass looking female underling had set her jaw for any amount of protest LaGuerta could throw.

"I could just order you back to Miami." LaGuerta said, her threat not ringing true.

"And I could just resign. Either way, I'm staying and I'm finding my brother."

Cuddy was reminded of a stubborn underling of her own not present and indisputably carved with the same unforgiving hand as this Morgan. The picture of never again experiencing House storming into her office and demanding another expensive test, a dangerous treatment, inquiring about her new bra size or even something as ridiculous as a worn and stained carpet.

Cuddy felt an overwhelming sense of loss.

"I want to talk to Angel and Doakes, and to who-ever knows this other guy, House." Debbie said.

Cuddy gathered herself and shed the emotional images for more practical actions. "I'll tell Doctor Wilson you're coming."

When Debbie Morgan had been excused to Wilson's office, Cuddy asked LaGuerta about any progress. "Have you found out anything more?"

"That's why I came today, to tell you we think we may have a lead. But until we know one way or another I can't tell you more." LaGuerta assured her. "If there's any chance of Doctor House coming out of this alive, it'll be because of Dexter Morgan."

"His sister, . . . she reminds me of someone."

LaGuerta didn't ask her to elaborate. "We'll know more in a few hours. Detectives Batista and Doakes are on it. I'll call you when I know."

Cuddy thanked the Lieutenant, watched LaGuerta leave and sat down to gather up her scattering bits of hope.

XXX

"I already told the other cops everything I know." Wilson said before Debbie got a word out.

A young woman who struck him as about twenty-one but if she was another detective (she acted like one), was probably closer to thirty-one, had entered his office without knocking and walked to his desk like a sole assault force. Her sun-touched brown hair loosely framing her sharp features without concern for flattery, she stood before him, even though it was his domain, the one in command.

Wilson recognized the law enforcement stride and the cast of the police woman's expression that said _I can be a bitch if I want to and you can't do a thing about it. _

"I know. I'm Detective Morgan." She showed him her badge and stood over his desk. If she was a relation to the other, Wilson could see no family resemblance.

"I want to know about Dexter." She said.

Wilson said wearily, his mind never far from House. "I don't know anything about him, other than he's missing." _And, since he showed up, my lover has vanished and now he's maybe dead. _

"He's my brother." She said and sat down in the chair opposite his desk. Seated, the authoritative square to her shoulders disappeared and was replaced by something rounder, more relaxed, less commanding and more empathetic. She was now just a sister terrified for her brother.

But she was sitting in the chair House usually sat in when he came to gossip about the nurses or the weird guy who sorts the mail. Today Wilson didn't like her sitting there. It didn't fit her at all.

"I want to know how he was." She asked. "Did he seem okay? Was he confident? Scared? Uncertain?"

"No. None of those except..."confident". Mister Morgan seemed to believe what he was talking about. He appeared to know exactly what he was doing, with Gre-, with Doctor House."

"Is there anything you can think of that you didn't tell the police?"

Wilson tried to think. It had become a difficult thing to do. Was there anything? Could he remember one thing that he had forgotten and that he might share with this police woman? Was there a special second or two, a word, a look, that would spark a _eureka!_?, so she would run from the room, gather the tactical forces around her, assault the killer's not-so-well chosen hiding place, corner him, shoot him, _kill him_ and therefore be rendered no threat to anyone anymore?

Then House might come walking out from...whatever place and bonds had held him, alive and, but for a few scrapes, unharmed. Wilson hoped for that improbable image while looking at this young, slightly built woman with the frightened eyes. But it was just a fantasy born of desperation.

"No. Nothing. I don't remember anything else. I told them everything about what happened that day, Dexter's warnings, the visit from the pharmacy guy. Your people are already checking into that. I even told them that House and I are lovers. At least they've stopped believing they've run off to Vegas together."

"I see." Detective Morgan stared sadly across the desk. She stood and wrapped her police woman suit of armor around herself again. "Dexter is going to be okay you know. He saved me."

Wilson heard her confidence in the man not present, and when she said the words, her tone defied him to disagree. "So your friend is going to be okay too." She turned to go and said as she left with hope piled upon hope, "Dexter's _always_ okay."

XXX

"Red, Red, Red,...no, no, no, _NO!" _Dexter saw the lacking preparations Red had, in line with Dexter's carefully worded suggestions, executed in the work shop. The tools had improved in caliber and design. Even the chair was gone. Dexter recalled hearing the grinding squeaks of a large wrench the previous night as bolts were loosened and removed. Red had even taken Dexter's urgent advice and soaked down the walls with water laced with lots of bleach to unravel any lingering traces of DNA which would send Red to prison before Dexter had a chance to send him somewhere far less cozy and dry.

But the walls were still bare and capable of absorbing new blood traces and bits of shed flesh. And so Dexter counseled his protégée' once more.

"It's no good." He gestured with shackled hands. "Just bringing him in here'll leave new traces. The walls should be lined with plastic and the joins sealed with tape. Grey tape would be my choice, if it were me doing this. Five hundred square feet ought to do it. And ten rolls of grey tape to seal it. There was a killer I knew who did it that way." _He and I are on speaking terms._ "It'll keep every bit of splatter contained. When you're done, roll it all up and carry it away - no one the wiser."

Red eyed him suspiciously for the hundredth time. "Why are you trying to help me? I'm going to kill you."

Dexter made certain to spice his answer with the right balance of an unstable personality laced with jealous fury. "Because I _am_ you!" Then he pretended to relax and apologize for his outburst with a child's voice and a finger tracing patterns in the dust of the concrete floor. "Deeply down anyway."

Red was shoved just inches aside from control. It was enough to throw him off kilter but not enough to incite anger. _I oughta' get an Emmy._

Dexter hoped House couldn't hear any their almost neighborly conversation. But the doc' was sound asleep. Well, not _sound_ asleep. House was unconscious asleep due to Dexter's nimble fingers. It was for the best. He had one more thing to endure. Probably just one more Dexter was sure.

Pretty sure.

Red had learned the play of the game quite quickly due to human weakness. His weakness: blind revenge. Red was born of a society that had rejected him and so he had rejected society. But he was still human, after a fashion, and plagued by things common to them like loneliness. Based on his own experience, Red probably even felt the need for love.

Dexter would happily provide him with it, along with a personal touch.

Red gestured with his gun. "Get back in your room." Red did not snarl. He even used his inside voice.

Dexter, hands shackled, struggled to obey Red's command.

Dexter sat next to House while Red bolted the door and went off to make the changes Dexter had explained.

Easily done. Red was angry, he was violent, vengeful and on track to be, if not New Jersey's greatest serial killer, at least a more accomplished one than he deserved to be.

_All because of me. What a nice fellow I am. _

Dexter heard Red returning and sounds of heavy things being dropped on the floor. _What have you bought for me? _

When the door opened next, Dexter held his breath. Had the freak done his freaking work?

"Get out here." Red ordered.

Dexter quickly complied and was deadly pleased to see several bolts of thick plastic and a bag of grey tape. Ten, twelve rolls at least. _Oh, Red, you shouldn't have!_

"You're doing this, since you seem to know all about it." Red tossed Dexter the keys to his hand shackles only, and Dexter, with some difficulty, removed them, tossing them to the floor.

Red frowned at Dexter's bright, shining eyes. "Well? Don't just stand there looking stupid."

_My delight. _

XXX

"Which one? Which company?" LaGuerta asked before Debbie had a chance to open her mouth and demand it.

Angel read the name "Sleigh-Mortinson's.". "One of their guys hasn't reported to work for at least a week."

"A week. Why the hell didn't they tell us sooner?"

"Excuse was the personnel supervisor was away and whoever was taking care of things overlooked it. The van was found abandoned and simply towed back to the plant, parked in its stall and logged in as usual. No damage."

"Fuck!" Debbie said, her face red. "Stupid fucks!"

LaGuerta ignored her volatile underling. "Get out there. Strip that fucking thing down to its bolts. The guy's name?"

"Dwayne Roger Gizah. Described as a loner but a "nice guy". No listed relations or emergency contacts. No friends. No one knows much about him."

"Why didn't our profile flag him?" Debbie asked.

Doakes answered for her. "He wasn't on the books as an employee. Was paid cash under the table. Probably an illegal immigrant. Middle Europe somewhere from the name. Maybe even a fugitive, and he only worked part time."

"Jesus." LaGuerta shook her head at how far the ball had been dropped.

"Check his last known address. And do all the interviews again from Sleigh-Mortinson's. Let's find this prick."

XXX

_Even in my unfeeling state of pretense, I can feel for House. I'm afraid for him. I worry that he's close to stepping through the door to marginal insanity. People think insanity is a place of hot and passionate emotion, but I think it's a cold, numb state that settles down on you like a frozen hand. It wraps itself around you, smothering spirit and will._

_House has that look in his eye. They've taken on an uncaring glaze because he's looking to the inevitable he thinks is upon him. When a person stops caring, they enter a place of stillness of soul where light and hope are outside the envelope of existence. It lies just beyond their fingertips, just beyond reach. If it wasn't so deadly, such a place would almost be a comfort._

_But I also know how strong a man House is and that he could come though this with almost no subsidence of self. He's a survivor._

_He's like me._

Dexter knew Red would be dead soon and so could afford the luxury of no pants. He had stripped them off and draped them over House. Filthy as they were, at least they were something next to his skin, providing a modicum of warmth. House's fever was gone. Either he had fought off the infection or his body had given up.

At the sensation of touch, House woke up.

Dexter kept his hands away. "How are you feeling?"

Hardly a voice left in him, "Swell." House said.

"Time's almost up. Go along with whatever fucked up thing I say and do, and you'll live."

Disbelief and hate, "Right." But in between long, pitiful sounding sighs of exhaustion and pain, the doctor found something within himself that was pure House. "_He's_ strong? Bet no one's shoved copper tubing up his rectum lately." He coughed, shivering in the dark, damp room. "If I wasn't chained, . . . bleeding, c-crippled and s-starving, I'd . . . kick his s-sorry ass."

A joke. Very encouraging, Dexter thought. Doctor Gregory House was still in there somewhere.

XXX

Detective Doakes, Morgan and three local detectives did not announce themselves when they kicked in the door only to find a long empty shack of a house. The former residence of Dwayne Roger Gizah.

"This place's been vacant for months." Doakes announced the obvious. Newspaper littered the floor of the three roomed house. It had a leaking roof and no basement. Not even a dirt crawl-space large enough to tuck away a corpse.

"Shit." Debbie said.

Doakes' cellular trilled. He answered it, listened to the voice on the other end. They all assumed it was LaGuerta. When Doakes hung up, "Angel's just learned Gizah had a girlfriend once upon a time. She used to work for the company but quite over a year ago. We have her address." He spoke to one of the two local Dicks. "Get forensics over here and go over this place. Maybe we can find out something more about this fuck." To the rest he said "Let's go."

Angel spoke to LaGuerta on her cell'. "The girlfriend's name was Marnie McManus. Two people thought they might have been seeing each other for a few weeks over a year ago. But she quit the company and it was thought she moved away."

LaGuerta nodded. "Thanks. We'll know soon enough."

Cuddy called LaGuerta. "Detective. I had Doctor House's staff make some calls. We had as many of his old cases faxed to your office as we could. I know your people have already gone over them, but I'm talking about his cases prior to working at Plainsborough. Doctor House fellow shipped under a Doctor Allan Samuel for more than two years at Boston General. Now that was a long time ago, I know, and Samuel died a few years back from natural causes but if there's something in these, something that's relevant?" She hoped to God, " . . . something that might help?"

LaGuerta congratulated the woman silently on her reasoning. "Thank you Doctor Cuddy. It's possible."

XXX

Dexter was in his element. He was home.

He readied the killing room for Red and himself. It was the phase of his personal preparations he had labeled the lullaby time.

The noise of the un-rolling grey tape...

_...zeeep, zeeep, zeeep,..._

Long sticky strips pulled from their rolls and applied to their designated joins. It often lulled him into a contemplative frame of mind._ This guy must die. Putting down a murderer is a good thing. Good for me. Good for society too._

A marriage of tape and plastic and sweet, sweet anticipation. Release the demon again for a while, let him revel in his freedom until he's exhausted, then tuck him way again for a while.

_...zeeep, zeeep, zeeep..._

For the watching mad-man with the gun, Dexter made up the needed bullshit on the spot. "Alistair Ellis developed this type of killing theater. I studied his memoirs over and over. He was a kind of genius."

Dexter smiled at Red. Not a friendly smile, not pleased, not happy, just teeth exposed in a tiny grin for himself alone. Dexter was doing what he wanted and doing what he pretended he wanted. Both for Red's benefit.

_Did I say Emmy? I meant Oscar. Encore performance coming up. I hope House can keep his mind together enough for me to save his life._

XXX

Part XI ASAP.


	11. Chapter 11

**Dexter in the House. **

**Part XI**

By GeeLady

Summary: Dexter/House Crossover. During his summer vacation, Dexter hunts a New Jersey killer. When he discovers who the next target is, saving him will be harder than he thinks.

Pairing: House/Dexter

It has been brought to my attention that Dexter is not actually a policeman/detective/officer. (I could swear I heard him called that). So in all following chapters those titles, when referring to Dexter will be dropped and eventually edited from the story. Thanks to my sharp eyed (and sharp memory-ed) readers!

Rated: M, NC-17, Mature, Adult! Language. Gore. Murder. Dexter/House Slash**. ****Harsh stuff****. **_**Dark themes, disturbing scenes. **_**If you ****do not**** want to read about torture or rape **--_**stop! .**_

Disclaimer: I like Dexter, he's sexy, but I would never try to abduct him 'cause I hear he has a dark side. And House, well, he just melts my buttons!

**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**

**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**

"Marnie was a nobody. Single woman living alone in her mother's House. Supervisor got a note from her one day that she had quit the job, sold the house and moved away to California."

LaGuerta and her team were stationed in a nearby precinct, regrouping in a borrowed interrogation room.

Doakes finished the emotionless report and handed his Lieutenant the work file of the woman in question from Sleigh-Mortinson Pharmaceuticals.

"Don't be so quick to label a middle-aged woman a "nobody."" LaGuerta said back evenly. As a woman in a traditionally male dominated profession, it was a subject she was particularly sensitive about. "Where does her mother live?" She asked Doakes rather than look for the information herself.

"No address listed."

"I don't suppose we have the note she gave the supervisor?" Angelo asked, sitting in a hard wood policeman's chair, his arms crossed. He was tense and worried about his friend. Dexter was resourceful and sharp as a whip but even he had his physical and mental limits.

LaGuerta found the information in the file. "That note was sent to the supervisor, left for him actually. Anybody could have left it. He didn't save it, just noted that she had quit and closed her file. No forwarding address where to send her last cheque. No mother listed as next of kin. Maybe too old. Marnie was over fifty. Mom could be in a nursing home."

"Or written it." Debbie added. "We should check out every M. McManus in Princeton and area."

"There's probably dozens." Doakes said. He for one was sick of riding around in a car, ringing bells and knocking on doors. Let the locals do it, he was a man who needed to take _action. _

"So we start right now. We recruit as many flatfoots as the precincts will give us and check out every McManus in the killing area." Debbie said, ignoring Doakes.

LaGuerta agreed with her female detective. "Get on it." She told them. "I'll speak to the Chief."

XXX

"And plastic garbage bags?" Dexter said evenly to Red. House was trussed up like a turkey on the floor of the work shop, a gag in his mouth and eyes looking beyond the room; outside the present; away from his own body tied up in preparation for the killing fantasies of a psychotic killer.

_Or perhaps two_, Dexter thought. _House hates me now almost as much as he hates Red. Hate the sin, not the sinner. _Dexter understood House's perfectly sound reasoning on the matter. Nothing but pain had come from Red. Awful but expected. A taste of sweet and mouth full of bitter had come from Dexter. Betrayal pure and simple.

Red gestured to the two bags of the black Glad Extra Hefties tossed in one freshly bleach washed and plastic-covered corner.

"Two Diazapam-filled srynges?"

On the makeshift plastic-covered shelf, laid out on fresh paper towels.

_Not my usual poison but it'll work._

"Four pairs of rubber gloves?"

Yes.

Dexter was teacher to the touched. "Rubber apron and splash mask?"

There and there.

Professor of the paranoid.

"Battery operated hand-held buzz saw?"

Uh huh.

Director of the deranged.

"Electric carving saw?"

Yeah.

"Four fifty pound bags of absorbent material?"

Every question Red answered correctly like only a good student does.

Lots of scoopable cat litter right over there.

_A-Plus Red._

Red's dead eyes were wide with excitement.

Oh, yes, one more thing.

"Pliers and snips?"

Red tossed both to the floor where Dexter was seated, hands and feet still shackled. "_Sweet._ Unlock my hands and we can start this show."

Red tossed him the keys to his hand shackles only and Dexter quickly shed them with a clatter. "I'm telling you, Red, you've outdone yourself. This is even better than Ellis."

_True!_

"This is almost . . . _sublime _. . ."

_Also true._

". . . and on so many levels."

Red's pale lips neared a sociopathic equivalent of a normal human smile.

_He looks like a dog while it's taking a shit._

Dexter was exhausted from six days in captivity, trying to keep his head together and House's head, mind and body together (as much as it was possible under the circumstances), and he was dirty, hungry and thirsty. Sitting on Red's hard plastic and concrete floor in his filthy underwear didn't help matters either.

But he was ready. _So_ ready.

As Red's anticipation and beastly need swelled, so had Dexter's hunger to end it. To end _him_. The moment was closing in and Dexter really just wanted to get down to cutting the bastard up. But Red wasn't standing close enough for that. He was still too awake and still too armed with loaded weapon.

First, prior to the slaughter of an innocent, Red of the limpy dick wanted another spunk show. He wanted his victim to experience the sexual function he took for granted as a thing made incomplete and horrible. Red wanted House to be just like him.

Red wanted someone else to hate that he could not be a true male, or even a person. Red wanted someone else to feel their dick and balls rendered unusable by the sheer act of brutal stimulation. Like stopping smoking by sucking on a hundred cigarettes. Therefore when the craving arrived one wanted to vomit rather than light up. Or, in the case of a penis, scream rather than cream.

Dexter looked over at Red with all the fake gratitude he could muster. His stomach turned. _I really hate this son-of-a-bitch._

XXX

Dexter twisted the flesh in the pliers pinchers until he could see the bruising color the skin purple. Then he'd start on a new place.

House whimpered with each fresh assault, his lungs heaving in a desperate attempt to shed the pain.

Still Red did not move from the wall. Still the gun stayed raised and level with Dexter's head.

_The man's getting a free show_, Dexter thought. _Gotta make it a private one_. Dexter slowly maneuvered himself, in the guise of trying to get more comfortable, so his own body shielded most of the view of House's writhing one from Red's line of sight.

Dexter could feel Red's eyes on his back, waiting for Dexter to move back again so he could see. But Dexter didn't do that.

"Hey. I can't see anything."

Dexter whined a little. Just enough to make it convincing, not enough to seem as though he were complaining. "My knees hurt."

"I want to see!" Red's voice grew a little more dangerous. Dexter fed the coals in the man's molecule sized soul by grabbing House's penis in his hand and beginning to jerk him off. House grit his teeth, and started to cry. He was enduring it. Hating it. Hating Dexter. Not wanting his life anymore. Not caring if he died or not. Just caring that it ends.

_Curtain's gonna fall._

Dexter moaned so Red would want to see. So he could watch and eat the vision of sex and pain, make it a part of him simply by observance.

_You want more than that red._

Dexter heard Red's booted feet shift the plastic as he moved away from the wall and closer to where Dexter was laying with his still chained feet stretched out full. Red could not see unless he stepped over the legs of the human object called Dexter.

Dexter raised the pain dial a good notch so Red would not change his mind. He bit House's shoulder hard, drawing blood.

It was just a little exciting.

Red thought so too, and drew in a breath. "That's enough. It's my turn."

Applause sounded in Dexter's head.

Red in his impatience to know sexually what he could never know, lifted one foot and stepped over Dexter's bound feet, telling Dexter to move away.

Dexter moved but not away. He thrust his legs out as hard and fast as he could, knocking Red's only foot remaining on the floor from beneath him. Red went down with a look of such surprise and shock, Dexter laughed. He kicked Red's temple with both feet before the man had a chance to get angry. Then kicked again.

Red was stunned enough that Dexter had his opening. He rolled quickly to the shelf and grabbed one of the srynges with chained hands, rolled back over to his victim and plunged it home into his neck. Red gurgled and slumped.

Dexter slumped as well, relishing the moment and giving his thoughts and body a few seconds to rest. He was war-weary. But still - victory!

Soon, the celebration.

-

-

-

Dexter unlocked the chains from his ankles. He rubbed circulation back into his chaffed skin, sighing. In freedom he walked over to where House, who might never be totally free again, was lying on the plastic floor, covered in the frenzied brandings of a madman and the reluctant wounds from a madman hunting zealot.

Dexter picked up the second srynge and bent down beside House. He was full of triumph battling for regret beating back remorse. One thing he could do for him, would do, was protect him from knowledge he need not live with or live in fear from. "You don't need to see this, Doctor House." Dexter, with far more care than he had with Red the-soon-to-be corpse, he plunged the drug into a chosen vein and watched his former cell mate slip into the temporary paradise of unconsciousness.

_I can spare him from this at least. He deserves it. _

_-_

_-_

_-_

When Red awoke, Dexter was there looking down on him, waiting for that long anticipated moment. "Good morning, Clarice." He said for his own amusement.

Red, strapped down on his very own hand made shelf by twists of plastic and length after length of the grey tape he himself had purchased on credit, his body immobile, his mouth stuffed with a rag and covered with more tape and all _that_ being held down with more twists of plastic expertly utilized like rope, certainly didn't see the humor in it. Even his head was held in place with bonds of tape and plastic.

Red could only watch Dexter move around the room, arranging the tools Red had bought on sale for forty-nine-ninety-nine (marked down from fifty-five), with the last of his available credit. The vials of drug Dexter had explained where to purchase and how, the srynges, the rubber apron and mask, the rolls of plastic and the garbage bags had emptied his bank account.

He stared up at the dull white ceiling as Dexter dashed upstairs. Red could hear his prisoners footsteps moving back and forth over his head. Water running in a sink. Doors being opened and closed. Then, the last door that lead to the back yard and the tumble down garage where the big freezer was. Big enough to hide a body in. Two even.

After not many minutes more, Dexter was back and looking at Red from the doorway. "I see where your I'm assuming girlfriend? and probably her mother, got to. Were you planning on burying the freezer? Was that your big plan? Like killing an innocent doctor in your basement and then - what? Dumping his body in your car and flinging it into a ditch somewhere like the painfully stupid amateur you are?"

His footsteps made odd _shooshing_ sounds as he moved around the room. Dexter saw the note of puzzlement of Red's face. "Oh, the noise? Cat litter to absorb any liquids. And I'm wearing plastic bread bags on the shoes I borrowed from your closet. I forgot to tell you to buy shoe protectors. Oh well."

"I suppose manners dictate I introduce myself properly and then ask you your name, but in this situation it's all kind of meaningless wouldn't you agree?" Dexter slipped the apron on over the clothes he had borrowed from Red's closet. "Besides, I don't give a fuck what your name is. I'm just here for the show." He took a deep breath. "By the way, your taste in clothing is about fifteen years passed its prime, Red. You really ought to have gone shopping. Bundy was a snazzy dresser. Olsen looked like a kindly uncle. Dalhmer managed to lure young men into his apartment again and again, so clearly he was doing something right. But _you_."

Dexter stood over him, bringing his flashing green eyes to withing three inches of Red's terrified ones. "You're just a novice. Not even! You're a bungling idiot. The only reason you got away with as much as you did for as long as you did, is because the local police are worse idiots."

Dexter looked to the cell at the end of the hall where he had laid out an unconscious House on a thin sponge mattress he had found in one of the bedroom closets. He had covered House with a clean sheet and blanket and soon, soon, he would get House the help he needed.

But first things first.

"So I'm going to show you how killing someone should be done." Dexter stripped off the rubber gloves he was wearing, tossed them in a waiting open garbage bag, and donned brand-new ones. He pulled the splash mask down over his face and his voice when he next spoke was slightly muffled by it. "Someone like you, I mean." Dexter rubbed his hands together like a starving man about to consume a gourmet meal.

"To begin, I'm going to test the theory Doctor House and I came up with while we were locked in that laundry room with your _non working_ camera." Dexter picked up the battery-operated slicing knife and pushed its ON button. A metallic hum filled the room. "Hmm. Smooth. Good workmanship." He turned it off and placed it back on the shelf. "You see, Doctor House thinks you're an old patient of Samuel's and I'm inclined to agree. I mean if your balls aren't missing in the physical sense," he laughed, a pair of short, mocking barks, "they're sure missing _character."_

Dexter next picked up the buzz saw and turned it on. A sharp whine emanated from the cruel looking device. Dexter smiled. "Wonderful sound, don't you think." He put it down. "Really Red, I'm impressed. You spared no expense for this stuff. I _appreciate_ that."

"Right! Back to your balls or lack thereof. They're missing in character because," Dexter continued with his lecture, "if you do have _real_ testicles in that sorry sack, they must be the size of grapes." Dexter leaned over Red. "You caved all too easily when I made it tempting to do so. Killing House would have been easy for you. But killing someone you think is like you, that's tougher." Dexter searched the others bugging eyes. "It all comes down to motivation, my friend. Your motive for killing me was nonexistent, other than to get rid of me as a potential witness to your mediocrity. Killing me would have taken thoughtlessly ice cold _guts_. So it came to me! _That's_ why you never touched me. You thought I was another you."

Dexter resumed his visual inspection of the thoughtfully provided tools. "I'm sure that's what you thought. And I had to make you think that so you'd relax a bit, you know, feel like you were talking to a kindred soul. Funny thing is, though I was acting, I was _not_ acting a part." Dexter gestured around the work shop. "As you may now observe, I am in fact a killer, but a much, much better one."

Dexter picked up a roll of grey tape and tore off a piece approximately two feet in length. "Now, you get to observe as I test Doctor House's theory." Dexter pushed the plastic covering Red's groin down until it was out of the way, until Red's genitals were fully exposed.

With horror, Red watched Dexter place his penis against his abdomen so its head was pointing at his belly button. Dexter took the length of tape at stuck it across the fleshly sausage to keep the penis in place. "Don't worry. I'm not going to cut it off, just getting it out of the way." Dexter made sure the penis was secure in its blanket of thick tape. "By the way, that nice station wagon in the garage - mind if I borrow that later? The bus service sucks around here."

Dexter took up the freshly sharpened Berber knife and showed it to Red, bringing it up close to his eyes so he could get a good look. "But I am going to cut off your scrotum and see if Doctor House and I were right."

Red couldn't scream when he felt the blade of the knife slice through his ball sack like it was made of cheese, the gag making that impossible. But he did scream as loudly as he could in his throat and inside his head. He felt the gush of his own blood pour out between his trembling legs, warming them, strangely, in the cold room.

The pain between his legs descended from an unimaginable height that sent his mind into silent screams of its own, to a sharp, unrelenting agony. Dexter held up two golf-ball-sized oblong shapes made from sterile rubber. "I'm guessing you must have had bigger ones put in at some point. Bigger but not better. These're filled with silicone gel." Dexter held one of the blood-smeared objects up for Red's inspection. "See? That's bad for your health, Red." Dexter squeezed one end of it and the other end bulged like a water-filled balloon. "But we were right." He tossed the fake oyster to the floor. "Cool, huh?"

Without missing a beat, Dexter looked over Red's body with objective scrutiny. "What comes next? Oh, right, back to the lesson." Dexter picked up the straight edged electric carving saw and switched it on. It's tinny hum terrified Red and soothed Dexter. "Here's how it'll go. First, I cut into your throat, deeply, so you begin to bleed out. Then in rapid succession, I cut off your hands and feet. Once your body in empty of blood, I can carve up your torso without too much more mess. Ever slice into an abdomen still plump with blood? Awful damn mess." Dexter glanced at Red with a wink. "I'm telling you all of this now 'cause by the time I finish with your throat you'll be dead and there would endeth the lesson."

Dexter picked up the buzz saw and turned it on. He held it up for Red to see. "Here's how you cut up a body. It's not unlike cutting salami. Less _crude. _After I remove your head, feet and hands, you bleed out_._"Dexter, eyebrows climbing his forehead like he knew what he was talking about, bobbed his head emphatically to underline the visual_. _"_Big _time!"

Dexter raised the saw and motioned with it near Red's elbow joints and then his knees. "Then it's just a matter of sectioning you into more manageable pieces. Your torso I'll cut into three easy chunks. With women usually two is enough. Then your arms and legs cut in two, and all the parts . . ." He spit a nonexistent seed pit out of his mouth like it was _that easy_! ". . . into the garbage bags they go."

Red was panting and squirming now, trying to loosen the restraints.

"Don't bother. Believe me. I've learned my lesson with fashioning less than secure restraints. Whew! Could _that_ have ended badly."

Dexter switched the saw's toggle over to high speed. "Okay, fasten your seatbelt, 'cause here we go."

_Too bad Red won't be around to watch the master cut him up. He would have loved this._

XXX

"Was that cheque sent off anyway? Somewhere?" After a dozen or more addresses proving to be the wrong ones, Debbie had a thought and dialed LaGuerta, asking the questions.

On the other end of the call, Debbie heard the faint rustling of paper. LaGuerta said. "Nothing in the employment file." Then she had a couple of thoughts of her own. "Did they write her a cheque off the books? Did someone pick the cheque up for her?" More furious rustling of paper. Then Debbie waited as LaGuerta made a land line call to Sleigh-Mortinsons.

She came back to the cell phone, speaking quickly, not wasting time they didn't have. "A cheque in Marnie McManus' name was cashed at the Wachovia Bank on South Clayton Street in Lawrenceville _two days _after she supposedly moved away. Cashed by - guess who? - Dwayne Roger Gizah. He had to provide a street address to cash it. It was endorsed over to him by McManus. How much money you want to put on that horse?"

"Nothing. What's the address on the cheque?"

"Number 56 Penlaw Road, Lawrenceville." LaGuerta hoped they were not too late. "Go. Approach with extreme caution. I'll get everyone over there on silent call." LaGuerta hung up.

Debbie knew silent call meant so sirens or lights. After all this, LaGuerta didn't want to lose the murderous bastard by warning him they were coming.

XXX

Part XII ASAP.


	12. Chapter 12

**Dexter in the House. **

**Part XII**

By GeeLady

Summary: Dexter/House Crossover. During his summer vacation, Dexter hunts a New Jersey killer. When he discovers who the next target is, saving him will be harder than he thinks.

Pairing: House/Dexter

It has been brought to my attention that Dexter is not actually a policeman/detective/officer. (I could swear I heard him called that). So in all following chapters those titles, when referring to Dexter will be dropped and eventually edited from the story. Thanks to my sharp eyed (and sharp memory-ed) readers!

Rated: M, NC-17, Mature, Adult! Language. Gore. Murder. Dexter/House Slash**. ****Harsh stuff****. **_**Dark themes, disturbing scenes. **_**If you ****do not**** want to read about torture or rape **--_**STOP! **_

Disclaimer: I like Dexter, he's sexy, but I would never try to abduct him 'cause I hear he has a dark side. And House, well, he just melts my buttons!

**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**

**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**

_**It's the middle of the night. **_

_**Red had performed all the usual before I cut into him: begging, bargaining, whimpering, then anger and finally he screamed plans for murderous revenge. **_

_**The usual song and dance. He knew the jig was up and the rest of his equally useless body parts, and him, were about to go bye-bye just like his bouncing balls. I've been waiting a long time to say it: Red is dead! **_

_**Thoroughly quenching, isn't it? **_

_**Doctor House is wrapped in a warm blanket sitting beside me in Reds dead girlfriends' squeaky-clean station wagon. I got him to drink some water and swallow some aspirin I found in Reds dead girlfriends' medicine cabinet.**_

_**House has sunk into a kind of stupor. He doesn't care where I'm taking him, but he's out of that basement. Soon he'll be away from me. **_

_**First I need to find a spot to dump some garbage bags full of refuse. Not in a ditch. I'm not an idiot. I have the perfect spot in mind. Somewhere no one will ever likely look, and if they do, most of Red will have joined apropos surroundings.**_

Dexter backed the station wagon - thank goodness it had a new muffler and the idling engine was sooth and quiet - down nearest the barn yard as he dared.

He was careful not to slam any doors and grateful that he had located the milk farm not that far from the suburbs of Lawrenceville.

In the moonless night, he thanked the animal gods that the farmer was of the more old fashioned type and instead of flood lamps with motion sensors that would drench the animal yards and main house like a noonday sun, he had but one tall light standard located half way between the house and barnyard and its meek beam allowed Dexter just enough illumination to see what he was doing and not trip.

Two bags at a time, Dexter crawled over the high wood fence and into the yard crowded with Holsteins all staring at him in that hypnotized way of cows, licking their snotty nostrils with their long wet tongues. Not a warning moo did they do. Good cows.

Dexter carried one bag after another across the few yards of barn yard to the destination of his choosing, a deep, brick-lined urine and cow-pie well situated next to the main brick animal house. Brick buildings. Old-time farmer for sure.

Dexter was in luck. The farmer had recently had the contents of the waste well sucked out and hauled away. Lord bless old-fashioned farmers. No waste slews to seep into the surrounding ground water for him.

Dexter dropped Red down the well one bag at time to join his brethren. He listened as the bags fell for a full three seconds. That meant it was good and deep. Unlikely the fleshly trash could be seen during daylight hours by kind, feeling humans.

Besides, there was always more cow shit.

Dexter wiped his hands on the back of a passing bovine, teats loaded with life-giving milk. "Thanks girl."

XXX

"Nobody here, Lieutenant." Doakes spoke into his cellular while, with gun drawn, scouted the rooms and hallways, checking his back. He checked the basement. Two clean rooms there. Really clean, like someone had swept in the corners. He sniffed. Fresh bleach. "Weird."

LaGuerta said over the cellular's tiny speaker, "Have forensics fingerprint and bag everything. And check the garage if there is one, and bag everything in there."

Doakes and Angel found the garage, the freezer and Dwayne Gizah's dead girlfriend and girlfriends dead mother. Two solid blocks of freezer-burnt human.

Angel, with his own hands protected by latex gloves, fingered the freezer's broken lock. "Why would he break the lock on his own freezer?"

"Maybe he lost the key?"

Doakes glanced around the dirt floor of the place. "Fresh oil stain." He said to Angel, shining his flashlight around. The one dangling naked bulb was burned out. "There was a car here recently. Let's find out what this Marnie girl drove and run the plate. Put out an A.P.B. on it."

Doakes shook his head. Dexter creeped him out but even if he couldn't stand Dexter, he could stand even less someone else who wanted to kill a cop or even a cop's creepy colleague.

Angel said what they were both thinking. "The son of a bitch got away."

Doakes looked at Angel but did not say the next thing. Where were Dexter and House? Doakes wondered if they should start digging.

XXX

This next part Dexter had to be very cautious about. He couldn't be caught driving his victim's dead girlfriends car around.

"House." Dexter said in his most authoritative voice. He maneuvered the car through the dark streets of Lawrenceville. First he had located a car wash and removed the farmers' mud from its tires and chasse. He didn't want the law authority to have reason to check out any farmers' barn yards. "House, you with me? You awake?"

House murmured. "Of course I'm awake. Who can sleep with all that yelling?" But, told in his painful voice and grey face, the joke was choked of humor.

"Red got away." Dexter said. "Actually, he ran away. I think he heard some sirens and got scared."

House said nothing. "Where are we going?"

"I'm taking you to a hospital." _Actually I'm driving around in a ten square block circle until I'm convinced you don't know or didn't see anything that would incriminate me._

"The f-fuck got away, huh?" House was barely conscious and unaware of how sick he really was. "You saved...me,...us...b-by gettin' luck. . .y?"

"Guess so."

House slipped back into sleep or what passed for sleep in his physical state. Dexter didn't think he'd get anything more from him or be able to feed him anything more.

Dexter turned the car in the direction of a strip mall nearest a Bus station hub, where plenty of buses traveled away to plenty of places, and gently encouraging House to his slippered feet (Dex had managed to find a few clothes of Red's that fit House as well), he abandoned the car.

Stumbling with House a few short blocks to a nearby kiddie playground in a park the size of a postage stamp, he sat the doctor down on the spring grass. Dexter sat down next to him and wrapped one arm around his shoulders. "You'll be okay soon. Doctor Wilson will be glad to see you." Deb' will be glad to see me. That gave him a nice sensation that passed for a feeling.

Dexter made certain they were close enough to Plainsborough and a place where people would soon be out and about but far enough away from where he left the car that it wouldn't raise unnecessary questions. He had no cell phone, and he could not leave House alone. House was so bad off in fact Dexter was reluctant to even knock on a nearby residence to ask for help.

If House died alone . . .

. . . No one should _ever_ have to die alone. Even those who deserved it usually didn't. Like _Red_.

In the east the first pink streaks of morning gave the nearby buildings a flesh tone. Dexter was glad that it was not a red sunrise.

XXX

"Local's found the woman's car. The dead woman's in the freezer. She and her moth-" Doakes explained to LaGuerta over the phone.

LaGuerta interrupted. "A woman walking her dog just found our people."

Doakes could hear the relief in her voice followed by a sigh that said _Thank God! _"They're being taken by ambulance to Plainsborough Hospital."

"How are they?" Doakes looked at Angel and nodded. Angel blew a lung full of tense air from his lips.

"All they'll tell is that they're alive."

"We're on our way."

XXX

Dexter spent no little time answering their questions as he was given a thorough medical check.

"And he never hurt you?" LaGuerta asked, while Deb', Angel and Doakes sat nearby watching. Deb' wouldn't take her eyes off Dexter.

"Other than depriving me of clothes, food and water, no, he never touched me. I hope he was never a dad."

"And he just parked the car and ran?" Doakes asked, his voice dead level. From experience Dexter knew Doakes was probably doubting his words.

"He heard sirens. He freaked." Dexter hoped it was vague enough to discourage an active investigation into the circumstances of their escape.

"Could you identify him if you saw him again?" Deb' asked. She wanted the bastard to pay and pay _big_. If she had caught him, she would have shot him without even thinking about it and made up a story later.

"Never saw his face." Dexter held a hand to his head, feigned some dizziness. "Look, he had us tied up with those plastic things you cops like to use. He heard sirens, freaked out and left us. I got the ties off with a pocket knife I found in the car." Dexter made motions at pants he wasn't wearing anymore, though he knew perfectly well he was in a hospital gown. "I think I put the ties in my pockets . . ." He looked vaguely at LaGuerta with a well acted puzzled face. "Um, I thought I was wearing them . . ." He trailed off, looking very confused and sleepy. (Dexter was careful to leave his fingerprints on the rusty cheap knife he had found in the glove compartment).

LaGuerta stepped forward and put a pedicured hand on his shoulder. "You look like hell."

"I'm really tired. Can we finish this later?"

LaGuerta nodded. "We're done. When you're discharged I'll need a detailed report - everything you can remember - when you're well enough."

Dexter nodded and lay down on the bed, pulling the clean, fresh hospital sheets up over his clean, fresh hospital gown in his clean, fresh hospital room. His thirst was gone, his stomach comfortable with nutritious food. It was the height of luxury.

Deb' walked over and kissed him on the cheek. "You saved that doctor. You're a hero."

Dexter was very fond of his sister and Deb' was fond of him. That felt satisfying. "I'm no hero. We just got lucky." Dexter lied. "He would have killed me too." He told the truth.

"I'll see you tomorrow."

Dexter waved a one-handed goodbye to Deb', linked his hands behind his head and closed his eyes. He felt good. He knew Doctor House wouldn't be faring nearly as well.

-

-

-

-

"He's in a state of under nutrition, and he's lost weight but nothing life threatening. He has an infection in his colon. Looks like it's from an inflicted injury." Wilson had obtained the report of House's condition from the emergency attending. He hadn't steady enough knees to have examined House himself. "Probably from some kind of . . .instrument, . . . pipe, plastic tube, tool handle . . ." Wilson cleared his throat, not liking reading the word let alone say it. "Rape. _Ahem _. . .p-probably multiple . . ."

Cuddy listened with a queasy stomach. "How is he mentally? Emotionally?"

"He hasn't yet regained consciousness. They're giving him antibiotics and fluids. Liquid nutrients will be started as soon as the tear in his bowel is cauterized." With shaking fingers Wilson lifted one corner of the medical notes and read the second page. "He has multiple wounds on his torso. Gouges, multiple contusions, deep _bite_ marks." He could not look at Cuddy. "Some of which will fade with time."

"Do you need time off?"

Wilson knew she was asking whether he would, when House was discharged, be taking him home to watch over until his friend was ready to return to work.

"Yes."

XXX

On a thin mattress in a cold room House saw nightmare visions and heard animal sounds. The whine of electric motors and the wet grind of meat carving. A memory of Thanksgiving dinner with mom and dad with the dead bird waiting to be consumed filled his insides and beat at his soul.

Outdoors dinner on a picnic table with a plastic table cloth held in place by those little clips. Plastic plates and plastic cutlery. Paper towels to absorb the hot fat that dripped from their lips. Mounds of yams in brown sugar sauce sprinkled with cinnamon. A red pile on every plate. Glasses of hot cider. Pungent smelling liquid that Greg hated. Cold wind shifting his new haircut that tried to stay in place with the greasy stuff his mom had mixed in the strands. Sweat rolling down his sides despite the cool wind because his dad was there looking over at him every-so-often with a stern brow and angry eyes, making sure he sat up straight, wiped his mouth, said please and thank you, and ate everything on his plate whether he liked it or not. Big father sticking a bar of soap in his mouth to wash it out because nine-year-old Greg had said "damn" right to his face.

Greg gagged and choked on it, the slippery liquid escaping down his throat against his will. It tasted sharp and bitter. Sour and salty like -

- House woke up with a start. Wilson was sitting beside him with concerned eyes and wiping the sweat from his face with a cool cloth. "Bad dream?"

House didn't answer, just gestured for some water. Wilson got it for him. "Doctor's say you can go home in a few days. My place, that is."

House didn't argue. Wilson's place where he wouldn't be alone with a psycho who made him swallow his limp, stinking dick sounded like heaven. He nodded.

Wilson smiled and scooted his chair closer, leaning over him, talking to him. Soothing things. Normal, hospital business things. Gossip and Cuddy's new blouses. The new guy she'd been dating. Foreman's relief, Camerons' bitten nails and Chases' worried frown. "All over you." Wilson said.

House listened and let the touch of Wilson's hands take him far away from Red and his basement. And from dreams. He kept his tired eyes on Wilson's kind ones. Wilson looked worried but happy. His gentle touches all over, even the delicate rubbing of the many square bandages covering the teeth marks on his insulted flesh, brought him closer to the surface. Closer to wanting to speak and touch back.

Returning him to life.

XXX

Dexter approached Houses' hospital room. The hospital had discharged him and Deb' was waiting to drive him home to Miami. But he wanted to see House first. He wanted to know if he had saved the man or not. Flesh wasn't the only thing that lived or died. Minds, hearts and souls knew all about living or dying too.

Dexter paused at the door. A guard was stationed there. Doctor Cuddy's precaution in case Dwayne Gizah showed up thinking to eliminate Doctor House as a witness to his serial murder mediocrity. A wise precaution but Dexter was one hundred percent sure Red was not going to show.

Through the tiny window of his hospital room, Dexter watched Wilson use his face, lips, smile and hands – even the soft breaths from his mouth – to bring comfort to his lover.

It was as though, by gently touching those parts of House that Red had violated, cut, bite or left his disgusting saliva or oily fingerprints on, were, one by one, being wiped away. Tenderly erased by touch alone.

Dexter watched Wilsons fingers caress the little squares of bandages on Houses chest and abdomen, where Red had bit with his teeth or scratched with his nails, bringing his own loving presence to bear against the inhuman shroud of Red; the still sickening memory of him on Houses skin and within his mind.

Wilson held Houses face in his hands and kissed him on the lips, the forehead and the cheek. Tiny deft motions of complete devotion. In his hands, House was his most precious treasure returned to him after the terror that he may have been forever lost.

Wilsons body leaned protectively over House as he spoke words to him that Dexter could not hear but knew must be full of affection and reassurance. Sounds of deep meaning only House would ever hear. Meant only for him. A cleansing air. A quiet rain of complete love to wash away the violence of Red's debris-littered storm.

Dexter wondered what it must be like not only to feel such love from someone but to express it.

He was very fond of Rita and the kids.

Did he love them?

Not yet.

But he desperately wished for it. Someday, when he no longer hungered for his need. When he didn't want to locate a killer and remove him from society. To act not merely to rid the world of something unpleasant, but to bring to his soul the pleasant thing it craved.

As long as he felt that driving hunger, Dexter didn't think he would ever experience the elusive and gold-edged thing called love. It was one aspect between himself and Doctor House that was not the same.

House had found his affection. Dexter was still waiting for his.

Murder and love didn't go together. Killing and genuine affection were enemies.

Wilson was leaning in closer, speaking things Dexter was deaf to and touching House again in almost all the places Red had touched him, but with gentle, sweet touching and with each touch, erasing, erasing the hurts until nothing was left of them but the visible scars. In time, with luck, only the surface scars would remain.

Wilson kissed House's lips once more and walked to the door. He seemed glad to see Dexter there. "Mister Morgan. I can't thank you enough for what you did for him. Without you . . ."

"I . . just did . . .what I thought . . .would help. We got lucky." Dexter looked into the room. "Mind if I say goodbye?"

Wilson shook his head, though he threw a worried glance through the doors window glass. "No, no. Not at all."

"I know he's tired. I won't be long."

Dexter approached House very cautiously. House appeared to be asleep but once Dexter was seated House had opened his eyes and was watching him.

"Hi." Dexter said.

"Hi." House answered.

House stared at Dexter in the way Dexter knew he would. He looked as a man who had spent a week half asleep in a nightmare where there were monsters in the basement, under the bed and even lying right beside him. But House was awake now and lucid. The realization that one of the monsters that had slept beside him in the shadow world of pain and fear was still alive and sitting three feet from his head. That truth was also alive and well and there behind Houses' careful expression.

That is how House looked back at him. That is how he knew Dexter. It was knowledge they shared without giving it voice.

House finally did speak. "Thanks for saving my ass but I don't want to know you any more."

Dexter wasn't surprised or even insulted by House's statement. He completely understood. He understood because House was no idiot. He was a strong man with a razor sharp mind. "That's probably for the best. I'm going back to Miami today."

"Lucky Miami."

Dexter did not try to interpret Houses' tone but he suspected it was not meant as flattery. "Feeling better?"

"Only compared to some."

Dexter also wasn't sure how to interpret that. "I'm not sure I know-"

"-How did Red get away?"

"Ran away. He got scared."

"Odd. That would have been a particularly difficult thing to do for an unconscious man."

"I'm sure. Only he wasn't unconscious at the time." Dexter said, knowing House knew that was a lie.

"Are you lying?"

"Why would I lie?" Not a real answer so _not_ a lie.

"I don't know."

Dexter tried directing the conversation elsewhere. "Are you going to be all right?"

"Probably."

"Is Wilson a good man?"

"The best." House frowned and looked up at the ceiling. "Did you know that in Europe in the sixteenth century, the Bubonic Plague could only be cured by cauterizing the festering wounds with red-hot pokers?"

Dexter sucked in his breath at the sudden and weird change of topic. But he was curious all the same. "Yeah. We learned all about it in high school. Is this-"

"- Weird isn't it? The infected often died from the pain caused by the cure. They escaped the disease that was eating them by dying of the cure. _Ironic."_

"Very."

"You really did get inside that guy's head."

House had switched right back to mention of Red, or Dwayne Roger Gizah as LaGuerta had informed him. "You were right, Dex'." She had said. "He's a serial killer."

_Not anymore._

House went on. "You really could read his mind, like you had _experience_ or something." House said.

Dexter listened to House expertly and casually speculate around a very dangerous topic without really saying anything about it at all.

"One might think that Red's getting away could also be seen as _ironic_."

Dexter smiled to himself. House really did have guts. "What sort of "irony"?"

"The usual kind, where the best outcome happens by way of the worst event."

House was getting too close to things he ought not to speak about ever again. The doctor had bowling _balls _between his legs_._ Dexter asked, "What are you trying to say Doctor House?"

House looked steadily at him. "Just saying I'm glad he "got away". I'm glad Red was "cured"." House folded his blanket neatly across his abdomen. "That way I won't ever have to think about him ever again. In fact, I'm sure I'll forget everything that happened. In time I won't even know to mention him anymore. To _anyone_."

"Are you-?"

"-I'm just thinking like a doctor. I am an infectious disease specialist. Just like you're a specialist too."

"I see. You're thinking like a doctor. We're discussing medicine."

"Exactly." House, through his bruises and bandages, showed Dexter a face of innocence. "What were _you _thinking like?"

_**I knew what House was asking me. Would he ever see me again for any reason at all? Would I feel the need to return and pay him a non-social visit? No. I "cured" Red and House knows it. But House hates disease too. One disease down. Hundreds to go. House and I are more alike that I suspected.**_

Dexter smiled at House and nodded to let him know he understood everything House had _not_ just said. "I'm thinking like a doctor's friend."

Dexter gathered up the small back pack Deb' had bought for him. In it she had put new razors, rubbing alcohol, shaving cream and other toiletries. Also new socks and even a tie the color of the bright blue sky. (When he got home Dexter was going to throw out his red one). There were also sandwiches and bottled water for the long drive home. Deb' was the best.

Dexter gave House one last look. House nodded a farewell only and said no more. What passed between their eyes would remain ever unspoken because between them it was already common knowledge. "Have a good life, Doctor House."

Dexter turned his back and walked away.

"Goodbye."

XXX

END

**From the site: **

**From the sub-category - Psychopathology:**

"The Hare Psychopathy Checklist - Revised (1991), or PCL-R, was developed by Robert Hare as a reliable measure of psychopathy.

"Two items on the PCL-R, lack of empathy and lack of remorse, are often seen in offenders of deviant crimes. Lacking empathy, offenders are able to view their victims as objects, to use and throw away as they please, not unlike a piece of garbage. By viewing the victim in this manner, offenders also seem to lack remorse for their actions, which protects them from feeling guilt. It should be noted that psychopaths can and do express feelings of empathy, remorse and guilt without actually experiencing the associated feelings. In other words, psychopaths can state that they feel sorry for their actions, or seemingly empathize for the victims, yet actually feel nothing. To the psychopath, these are simply words they have learned from others that describe the appropriate feelings, but are only used to gain a future victim's trust or to minimize punishment. Cleckley (1988) appropriately called this a "mask" because these words or actions of the psychopath do not truly reflect his internal world. The exception to this seems to be the secondary psychopath (Sue et al., 1997)

Grandiosity is also a hallmark of psychopathy, and there are those who have argued that psychopathy is simply an extreme form of narcissism. According to Meloy (1997), the main difference between narcissistic personality disorder as described in the_ Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, (4th ed.) _(1994) and psychopathy is the way in which the individual devalues others. He further states that in _Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) the individual devalues others in fantasy, while the psychopathic personality devalues others by aggressive means. As one may imagine, psychopathic offenders may be viewed as aggressive narcissists that commit offenses to restore or further build upon their own sense of being dominant, powerful, or otherwise better than their victims.  
_  
Psychopaths are wonderful at lying and manipulation, which allows them to gain the confidence of future victims. In addition, these individuals are impulsive and seemingly strive for excitement, while disregarding any responsibility for their actions. This is often displayed through chronic antisocial acts (those which deviate from the socially acceptable norms of society and violate the rights of others), because the psychopath also seems to lack the ability to conceptualize the consequences of his or her actions. _Yet, this does not mean that psychopaths do not know right from wrong; it is more a matter of __not caring __whether it is right or wrong."  
_  
XXX


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